Progeny
by alexajaye
Summary: Sequel to Resurrection. While investigating a disappearance in Buffalo, NY, Sam gets the feeling they've met the girl who's vanished, and the reappearance of Michael gives way to the fact that Lilith's children haven't given up on Mary.  Rated T - M.
1. Intro

**First things first, I obviously don't own Supernatural, but I do own this story.**

**Second of all, this is a sequel. There are certain things you will need to know before reading this. So before you proceed, you should read "Resurrection." It's on my profile page, and if you've already done that, then by all means, please, Read.  
**

**Third. There are timeline issues that will settle themselves after the first few parts, but this first part takes place just after the last story. As it clearly states right off the bat.**

**Lastly, if you do read, I really hope you enjoy this. Even though Supernatural is in its Sixth Season, I've decided not to make any references to it. Strange I know. But this story follows directly after the last one which was written before Season Six started. It's a completely alternate universe story now. You've been warned.**

**I'm also going to be re-editing Resurrection, as there are a lot of typos and such that need to be addressed, so if you read, please be aware of that.**

**Go on, now! Read!**

* * *

**Intro**

**Things Past**

**Three days later . . .**

Adam stood in front of the lone mirror in the bathroom perplexed by the scar over the left side of his abdomen. It wasn't just any scar, and even though he was the only one who knew that, the fact that it was there confused him. He figured it was because it had to be there, but then why let him live? Why had he survived with nothing but a scar to show for all his troubles if he was just going to be brought back in the first place? He knew it was because of Mary. He knew Michael was more interested in her than the Archangel had let on, and that's why he was standing here staring at a scar the length of his pinky as it marred his lower abdomen. Like a memento. Some memento.

The stitches that had succeeded in holding his guts in had already dissolved thanks to whatever Michael had left inside him, but the scar remained. It was a blatant reminder of the power that had once been housed inside him, and every time he saw it, he remembered exactly how close he'd come to dying. And Michael had apparently gone against orders from _someone_ by saving him. Adam didn't really like being indebted to an Angel, but since it was that very thing that had allowed him to survive surgery and the few days since then, he couldn't bring himself to think anything bad had been done on his behalf. No deals. No payback. No retribution. He still couldn't believe it.

From his back pocket, the letter Dean had left him now felt like it was burning a hole through his jeans. He still hadn't told Mary about the letter, only that Dean and Sam had left and probably wouldn't be back. He didn't tell her they were on their own and definitely would be for the rest of their lives. And after traveling on two buses to get where they were now, she was sleeping on the bed from the night before. She hadn't cried or yelled or complained. She hadn't asked what they were going to do now that they were alone. He didn't know if she was hiding it or not, but she hadn't really been like this since he met her, and he didn't know how to explain that everything was going to be okay. She actually hadn't really talked since then either. And it was getting kind of nerve wracking.

At a pause in his thoughts, Adam heard the bed creak, and within a half minute, Mary was behind him. She put her tiny arms around his waist, and Adam extended his arm to hold onto her as she laid her head over the middle of his back. He knew she was scared, and it was up to him to get her through this. He was scared, and it didn't matter how much he told himself that he could handle anything that happened. Without Dean or Sam around, he was starting to feel a very heavy weight settle on his shoulders. He wasn't ready for it, but he knew he would do anything he could to make this better.

Slowly, Mary lifted her hand to his stomach, gently laying her fingers over his scar and then leaning back to lift her eyes to his.

"Are you going to take care of me now?" she asked softly.

Adam sighed heavily, stepping back and leaning over to be level-eyed with her. "It looks that way, kiddo," he confirmed. "But everything's going to be okay. I might not know what's going to happen tomorrow or any day after that, but I promise I'm going to do everything I can to make sure you're all right. Okay?"

She stepped forward then, moving her arms around his neck, and he reciprocated easily, wrapping his arms around her and then lifting her in his arms to hold her against him. He stood there several minutes holding her, setting her down on the floor and then stepping back. "Brush your teeth, and then we'll go get breakfast okay?"

She nodded silently, and he stepped around her, moving into the room and closing the door. He looked up with the intention of picking up their room only to discover Michael there at the door.

For a second, he jumped, grasping onto the doorknob and thinking something was wrong, but then Michael smiled, and Adam knew why he was there.

"She's not ready," he told Michael, attempting desperately to sound much more resolute than he actually felt.

"Ready for what, do you think?" the Archangel asked. "I'm just checking in. I am invested in your well-being as much as I am hers, you know."

"Whatever you're here for, she's not ready for it. She just started talking again, and she needs time to get used to this."

Michael smiled knowingly, and Adam thought for a second the angel was still trying to toy with him like he'd done before. He thought Michael knew exactly what was happening and what would happen and only wanted to test Adam's resolve to see it through. He absently noted that Michael looked exactly the way he'd looked in their "meeting." He was even wearing the same shirt. Adam tried not to let that bother him, but he failed, allowing his worry and fear seep through the façade he was hoping no other supernatural thing would be able to see through.

"Take it easy, champ," Michael soothed, and Adam couldn't help but feel at ease despite his previous concerns. "I just came to tell you I'll be watching you. And I wanted you to know that I'll be intervening when things get a little complicated for the two of you. Because if Sam didn't tell you a year ago, he should have. You'll need to go deep — deeper than you ever thought possible, and you won't be able to make contact with your brothers for a very long time."

"Why?" Adam asked, his voice coming out of a whisper as he opened his mouth. "What's happening?"

"I wasn't able to dispose of all Mary's siblings," Michael explained, stepping a little closer to Adam despite already being within arm's reach. "They'll be following her."

"But we killed Lilith. For good this time. How can they still want Mary?"

"Lilith's offspring serve a purpose, Adam," he revealed. "Even without her to guide them, they're still going to fulfill their purpose. My main purpose will be to keep the two of you hidden from them. But I can't do it alone. I'll need your help. And when any of them get too close to you, I'll have to go against my Father's will to prevent them from fulfilling their purpose."

"What is their purpose?" Adam asked softly, feeling the hair on the back of his neck stand on end suddenly.

Inside the bathroom, the water shut off, signaling Mary finishing with her teeth, and Adam glanced behind him to see the door coming open slowly. He looked in front of him, but Michael was gone. Adam exhaled the breath he'd taken in upon seeing the Archangel for the first time since almost dying, clenching and unclenching his fists for several seconds as Mary stepped into the room quietly.

"Can I have pancakes?" she asked softly.

Adam looked at her, thinking absently about how much money they had left, and he reached into his pocket where he usually kept his phone. For the few seconds he stood there, he honestly thought about calling Dean. If Michael was going to be hanging around, then it meant they weren't really safe no matter what had already happened. And if Dean knew that, then he should've told Adam somehow. Shouldn't he?

But then he looked at Mary, slipping his phone back into his pocket and taking her hand to pull her to the door so they could get some breakfast while he looked for a place to settle. Whether it was ideal or not, Mary needed structure and stability, and she wasn't going to get it moving from one town to another and gambling her way from one bar to another one. He'd pick up a map on the way, and maybe even a paper. They needed to find a place as far away from civilization as possible. And he would need to get some supplies.

* * *

Michael stepped out from the shadows of the bathroom the minute the door was closed, and he leaned against the bathroom door perplexed. He'd spent the better part of a week doing everything in his power to get Adam to trust him, and the kid was still on edge in his presence. He was still defiant and stubborn. But that was to be expected, Michael supposed. Dean had been the same way. The difference now was that it served an entirely different purpose altogether, and Michael decided he would just have to get used to having that effect on people.

In the three days since Adam's release from the hospital, he'd been able to divert two separate planned attacks by Mary's siblings, and he knew another one would be coming. It was just a matter of being prepared. He would have to sway a few of the people Adam and Mary would come into contact to for the next several days while they traveled to where they were going to be settling. If it helped, he would make sure they were well-hidden and protected from every supernatural thing that could possibly cross their path, but the Lilin were a separate story all by themselves. They had special abilities that made tracking their own as easy as breathing. The more Mary was out in the open, the easier it would be for them to find her. In three days, Michael had decided to be very selfish where she was concerned.

"Do you really think you'll be able to save her?" he heard and turned to see Eleanor there alone. She moved closer to him, and he smirked slightly.

"This doesn't concern you," he informed her. "The Lilin are my responsibility. Shouldn't you be off doing something right about now?"

She reached for his face, prompting him to look into her clear green eyes that no longer held any malice or deviousness. "Well, I was one of them. And I do know how they think. And you know they'll continue to look for her no matter what you do. It's only a matter of time before they get to her, and when they do, we both know they'll do everything in their power to twist and coerce her into becoming their leader. And by then, there'll be no turning back for her."

Michael took Eleanor's wrist, holding her hand away from him. "Well, until that day, I'm going to do everything in my power to protect her. It doesn't matter how difficult it is. If she falls to them, that's it. There'll be no more. And with your new perspective, you'd think it'd be in your best interest to help me. Even Castiel knows how important it is to keep her safe."

Eleanor smiled, leaning closer to Michael until her face was only a few centimeters from his. "Then by all means, consider me your consort, and do with me what you will."

She pressed the front of her body to his, attempting to entice him the way any of the Lilin would if he were a Human man. But Michael didn't say no, and he didn't say yes, sensing Mary's location despite the sigils meant to keep her hidden and then following her with Eleanor in tow. If she was volunteering, he wasn't about to refuse her help. He knew she felt connected to Mary, and he could use that to his advantage.

* * *

Dean took one last swig of his beer before he and Sam were supposed to hit the road after stopping at Bobby's for a few days. He didn't think about the fact that he didn't know where Mary and Adam were. He didn't think about the fact that he hadn't talked to his youngest brother in three days, and he tried real hard to remind himself that it was for the best. Now that he and Sam had another job to do, they were going to be moving out and driving in the opposite direction of where Mary and Adam had been left.

"Not thinkin' about taking one for the team, are ya?" he heard, turning to see Bobby there alone. Dean sighed softly.

"Meaning?" he countered, holding Bobby's gaze for a few seconds as he leaned back against the driver's side of the Impala.

Bobby huffed, his eyebrow raised as he responded. "Meaning you're thinkin' about gettin' in this car and makin' a break for the Sunshine State," he accused.

Dean didn't say anything for another few seconds, looking around the salvage yard and thinking of the last time Mary had been here. He forced that thought away, throwing away his beer. "I'm not thinkin' about going to Florida," he assured Bobby. "Besides, I left them in Georgia. Going to Florida would be pointless."

Bobby scoffed, leaning into the car. "You know what I mean. You also know it would be a big mistake for you to do what we both know you're thinkin' about doin'."

Dean folded his arms over his chest, deciding not to respond.

"You did the right thing," Bobby told him, to which he scoffed himself, unconsciously grinning at the ridiculousness of this whole thing. "You did your best, but this life ain't safe for everybody. Adam will know how to keep her safe."

To that, Dean spoke. "You know, I keep telling myself that. I keep thinkin' it was for her own good. Because the truth is, I could only do so much, and it was the same with Sam. We taught her everything we could, but there were things we probably really shoulda never taught her. And now she's gonna know that stuff out there is real. I really wish I could change that. I wish I could take all of it back so she didn't have to know ghosts and vampires and werewolves are real and they could kill her."

"But ya can't take it back, son," Bobby reminded him. "Ya know, sometimes, pulling the wool off someone's eyes is the only way to keep 'em safe. Knowin' what's out there and how to kill it can sometimes comfort a person. And now that she knows, she'll have that knowledge, and it'll keep her sharp. It'll keep her from screwin' up. And so will Adam."

Dean breathed deep, feeling his chest a little tighter than he had since leaving Mary and Adam. He opened his mouth to speak, only to be interrupted by Sam as he came closer carrying his bag.

"Hey," he said, looking at Bobby and then Dean. "We're ready to go. I got all the information there is about our next job. That poltergeist in Bensonhurst won't know what hit it."

"Good," Dean said, rising slowly and stepping back to open the door. "Let's move."

Sam stepped around to Bobby's side, embracing him easily and thanking him silently before he moved around to the passenger door to get into the car.

Dean didn't say anything to Bobby, only lifting his eyes to the man who was like a second father to him and then turning on the engine to put the car in gear so he and Sam could get on the road. Bobby didn't say anything either. There wasn't anything left to say.

* * *

**I know it's been a very long time, but I promise I've been working on this the whole time. I wanted it perfect, even though I know that's nearly impossible. I've got the story pretty well mapped out, so it shouldn't be too long before I update again.**

**See you on the next run!  
**


	2. Familiar Faces

**Okay, all you Supernatural fans! This is Chapter Two, which you should be primed for if you read part one.**

**We're skipping ahead quite a bit for a very good reason, and we'll all find out as the story progresses exactly what's been going on during the "down" time.**

**Thanks to my reviewer! I'm really glad you've been waiting for the story. I hope you like it.**

**Read on!  
**

* * *

**One**

**Familiar Faces**

**10 years later . . . **_**Buffalo, New York**_

It was raining when Dean Winchester pulled up to the curb of the marked-off house dressed in one of his best suits. Over the last two days, he and his brother Sam had been driving to Buffalo to get into town before the real authorities showed up, and so far, they'd done a pretty good job. As of this morning, only the local authorities had talked to the family that had once resided inside this house, and Dean was grateful his persuasion skills hadn't suffered over the years. He was also grateful for what a little bit of technology had allowed Sam to do in stalling the FBI from showing up the way it was supposed to when anyone under the age of 18 disappeared into thin air. Sam was swearing this whole thing was a little strange, so while he visited the local police precinct, Dean was going to take a look at the house.

It was a nice house, from the outside anyway, but with Dean's experience, looks were always deceiving. The front entryway on the porch was taped off, but he pulled it from his path, retrieving his lock pouch from his jacket pocket and using it on the front door before he made his way into the foyer of the house. From this vantage point, he could see into the living room and the dining room, and he took note of all the furniture and the fact that it was all still completely in order. Dean remembered from the newspaper that all the action had taken place upstairs, so without so much as a glance around, he made his way up to the second floor. He pulled out his EMF on the way to check for spirits, looking at the pictures on the walls and noting two things immediately.

The victim Beth Mason was blond haired and blue-eyed unlike her mother and her father who were brown haired and brown-eyed and looked nothing like her. The paper had said Beth was only sixteen, but she'd also been a straight-A student on the cheerleader squad and the star quarterback for a boyfriend. She'd only lived in Buffalo about six years after her father had passed away and her mother had remarried rather quickly. While that did seem a little strange to Dean, what other people did was none of his business. Right now, all he really cared about was finding a teenage girl who'd disappeared from her bed without a single trace.

The EMF was completely silent as Dean made his way to the second level of the house, and he began looking in all the rooms along the hallway. The first door on the left was a small bathroom colored in various blue tones, but it didn't look like it had been touched in a little while. Dean checked all the soap and cleaning products, noting they were all feminine scents, so he figured this had to be Beth's bathroom. He checked the medicine cabinet, but the only thing he found was Tylenol and a couple of toothbrushes.

The next room was a considerably larger bedroom than Dean had been inside in a while, and with the furniture and the tacked on bathroom, he guessed it was the master bedroom meant for the parents. He checked every corner of the room, spotting a few more photos that looked like vacation pictures and taking a gander through the walk-in closet. But there was nothing out of the ordinary. There were only a few items in the clothes hamper in the bathroom, and the shower didn't even look like it had been used in several days. Dean remembered the mother and father were staying in a hotel until the local investigation was completed, but he doubted they would come back to the house. No parent he'd ever talked to went back to the house where their child had disappeared from.

The last room on the left, down the hall from the bathroom, Dean found Beth Mason's room as it set dimly lit from the white-grey clouds outside. Rain pattered the window as Dean stepped into the room, and he looked from left to right at the dresser and then the bed which was unmade like the girl had been there but had gotten up in the middle of the night for no reason. Since his EMF meter was still silent, Dean put it away, moving the window slowly and looking down to see a twenty foot drop to the ground with no apparent way to get to the ground other than jumping. He tried the window, discovering it unlocked, and he lifted it slowly, looking over the window sill and seeing it clean of every strange substance he could think of. No blood, no glass, no dirt. No sulfur.

"Hmm," he whispered softly, easing his fingers along the window sill and coming up with nothing except water from the rain as it made itself known on the carpet beneath the window. "Not a demon."

He turned to the bedroom, glancing over the bed and moving to the table next to it where a small digital clock, a notebook and a photo cluttered the top along with a lamp. He turned the lamp switch, but the light didn't come on. He check the bulb, but it looked good. He didn't understand why the light wouldn't come on. The notebook beckoned his well-worn hands to it, and he picked it up slowly, noticing the guy in the photo with Beth. He looked like he was in his early 20's with brown hair and green eyes, and Dean thought maybe it was a cousin or brother. But Beth Mason was an only child, and neither of her parents had said anything about a cousin anywhere nearby with the ability to visit very often. Plus this guy looked a little too cozy with Beth to be a relative — the hand he had low on her hip was evidence enough of that.

Dean sat on the bed, opening the notebook and instantly seeing the last entry that looked like it was only half-finished. He didn't like making assumptions, but it was almost like she'd been writing in her notebook only to be stopped by something. He wondered what would usually pause a teenage girl when she was writing in her journal, and he immediately looked up at the photo and the boy standing beside Beth as he wore a football uniform. "I wonder what you were doin' a week ago, Mr. Star Quarterback," he said softly.

With two things he had working to his advantage, Dean quickly took the picture from the frame and then the notebook, rising from the bed and pulling out his phone to call Sam to see if he'd had any luck with the local authorities. Dean didn't have any hopes in a place like this, but they had to look at every area of possibility. No matter how much time had passed, Dean knew the world was just gonna keep getting worse, and it was his job to make sure people were safe — even if that meant keeping them safe when they didn't know what was out there. Dean had been doing this his whole life, and even though there had been a time when he'd said he wouldn't be doing something like it at his age now, it was all he knew. It was all there was for him now.

Sam answered his phone after just a couple of rings, his voice soft like he was having to whisper, and when Dean heard him, he thought there might be something wrong. "What?" he snapped at Dean.

"Hey, I'm just checkin' in," Dean informed his younger brother. "What's up with the golf announcer voice?"

Sam sighed over the phone. "Sorry. I'm in the library checking the old papers for any other disappearances."

"What happened to the police station?" Dean asked, making his way from Beth's room to leave the house. "I thought you were gonna talk to the new sheriff in town."

"Well, I talked to him. He gave me the run-around, just like I expected. But I was able to get a copy of the police report from his desk, and I figured I'd come over here to see if there was a history of disappearances in the area. Local police are always distrusting of the big guys in town, so I didn't see the point of hanging around."

Dean smiled, stepping onto the front porch and making his way to the car where he'd parked it down the street. "Nah, you just don't have the magic touch, my boy. Cops always respond to me better than they do to you. Always have, always will."

Sam scoffed. "Just because you have wing-tips doesn't mean I can't get information out of the cops," he accused. "What did you find at the girl's house?"

Dean slid into the driver's seat, glancing around the street and then turning on the car to get to the library. "Well, no sign of a struggle. Nothing in the house out of place. No blood, no glass. No sulfur. EMF was clean. The only way out of her room had to be the door — her window had a twenty foot drop outside it. I don't know if she could fly, but my money's on something grabbin' her after her parents were asleep. You remember, they said she was in bed when they turned in."

Sam inhaled deeply. "Yep. You on your way now?"

"Uh-huh. Try not to do anything I wouldn't do until I get there."

Dean turned off his phone then, pulling through the neighborhood and looking up the address to the library where Sam had apparently parked himself.

* * *

The Buffalo Public Library was in the middle of Lafayette Square and when Dean pulled up in front, he could see from the inside of the Impala that it was going to be snowing pretty soon. The sooner they got this tied off and back to the motel, the better. Dean grabbed everything he'd collected at the Mason house, stepping out into the frigid air and pulling his coat over his shoulders tighter just as his cell phone buzzed from his front pocket. He pulled it out quickly, seeing a text and a picture, and he opened it without thinking.

_Happy birthday!_ was the main message.

Dean smiled, opening the picture and seeing the face he'd been needing to see all day. He'd been thinking about this face a lot in the last few days, especially with this case, even if this face was contorted with her tongue sticking out and her eyes crossed. Even from so far away, she really did know how to make him smile. Quickly, he composed a reply and hit send, arriving at the doors to the library and stepping inside out of the cold. It was warm and kinda homey inside, and Dean pulled off his coat as he glanced around the room for Sam. He spotted a pretty, young red head behind the counter, and she smiled at him.

Even though that would've usually prompted him to make a move in her direction, Dean reminded himself about what was really at stake here. He thought about Lisa and Ben and Elizabeth. His daughter. Over the last ten years, Dean had been keeping tabs on her, and her birthday had been about four months earlier. Lisa had sent him a few pictures from her birthday party, and at that thought, Dean bowed his head and turned to the stacks of the library so he could find Sam.

His brother was sitting in a quiet corner of the library surrounded by papers and photocopies, and he was sitting at an old viewer looking at old newspaper prints. Dean looked around, seeing a few high school students and an elderly couple, but otherwise the library was quiet. It was normal, Dean supposed, at least for the time of day and the impending weather, but he made a note of it all the same. He pulled a chair from a table nearby, moving up behind Sam and looking over his shoulder.

"You're not scouting for porn or nothin', are you?" he asked, watching Sam stiffen and glance behind him with a scowl.

Dean smiled, moving closer. "What you got so far?"

Sam huffed softly. "Not a lot. I've looked back a few years, but so far, there isn't a history of disappearances in the area. Actually, for a major metropolitan area, there isn't a lot of strange activity at all, and that's weird."

"Mm," Dean murmured, reaching into his coat pocket to pull out the picture he'd found. "Well, I think we should look for this kid," he told Sam, allowing his brother to look at the picture. "I don't know, but it looks like he's kinda close to her, don't ya think?"

Sam looked at the picture for a minute or two before he put it down on the desk and went back to the viewer. "Maybe," he mumbled.

"Maybe?" Dean repeated. "What do you think we should do, Sam?"

"Well," he said, "even though there isn't any history of disappearances in the area, I was thinking it was a little strange that neither one of Beth's parents heard anything. Especially since a girl leaving her room in the middle of the night isn't exactly uncommon, but — "

Sam stopped, his eyebrows furrowed together as he magnified an image on the viewer in front of him.

"What is it?" Dean asked.

For a minute, Sam read silently, and Dean leaned closer, trying to see what he was seeing. And for another minute, Dean glanced around the library, checking the room and making sure no one was looking at them.

"Sam," Dean said again.

"Well, apparently, the area hasn't seen a lot of disappearances, but it looks like Beth has that market cornered."

Dean looked at the viewer. "What?"

"Three months ago, the local paper ran a story on Beth Mason and her boyfriend Sullivan Travis. The head cheerleader and the football quarterback. It was for a charity for abused and exploited children, and it says that Beth herself was the victim of a kidnaping. When she was six. But she was found and returned to her parents."

Dean listened carefully, his memory doing a number on the situation he was in right now, and he thought back to the photos he'd seen at the Masons. Beth was blonde and blue-eyed, and both her parents were brunette with brown eyes.

"Dean," Sam said after another minute. "I think I know this girl. I think we saved her ten years ago."

Dean looked at the picture of Beth again. He looked at the guy in the picture closer, seeing his brown hair and green eyes, and he remembered everything all over again. "Sam, this isn't right," he said seriously, as if any other time wasn't serious.

"Tell me about it," Sam scoffed. "How weird is this that this girl gets kidnaped again after ten years?"

"No, that's not what I mean," Dean said. "The pictures in the house. Those aren't her parents. And if they're not her parents, then who are they? And where are her parents? The ones we met ten years ago."

Sam reached out and turned off the viewer to gather the papers around him. "I don't know," he said, "but there's only one way to know for sure."

Dean huffed himself, picking up the picture and following Sam to the front desk to return the materials he'd borrowed, and after only having just entered the library, Dean winked at the pretty girl behind the counter and pulled his coat back on. Sam followed suit, and together, they left the library to do a little more interviewing with the parents who'd turned out to not be Beth's parents at all.

He went over everything he'd learned so far despite there not really being a lot to go on. He remembered everything that happened ten years ago, and he also remembered that Annabeth Miller had been the sixth girl to disappear, not the first. And if this wasn't some ordinary kidnaping and something was starting over again, then it was possible there were other girls who'd gone missing. Dean didn't like thinking that at all.

* * *

The hotel Beth Mason's parents were staying in was just a few blocks from the library, and after calling ahead to make sure the couple was still checked in, Dean pulled around and got his badge ready. Sam grabbed everything they'd found so far, and together, they got out of the car to make their way up to the floor where James and Melinda Mason were currently staying.

"So what do you think?" Sam asked.

Dean shrugged as they crossed the lobby. "There was no sulfur. No blood. She's gotta be somewhere, and someone took her. If they're not demons, then this is a whole new ball game for me. You?"

Sam also shrugged. "Shape-shifter, maybe."

They stepped onto the elevator, and Dean thought over everything again.

"It can't be a shape-shifter," he said certainly. "Or this is the longest one I've ever tracked. I haven't seen any skin shed, and as far as I know, both her parents — or whoever they are . . . I haven't seen any of the signs."

"So we don't know what this is," Sam deduced.

Dean shook his head. "Nope."

"Good to know."

When the doors opened, Dean led the way out, and he kept going over everything he knew so far.

"Witches?" he suggested.

"Did you find any hex bags in the house?" Sam asked as they walked.

Dean sighed, annoyed. "No."

"Vampires?" Sam offered.

"Seriously?" Dean scoffed. "I think I'm a little better than to miss that. I still think we need to talk to the boyfriend."

"After this," Sam stipulated.

Dean glanced at Sam, still annoyed.

Finally, they arrived at the Masons' hotel room, and Dean eyed Sam before he knocked. The door opened slowly, and the small, brunette figure of Melinda Mason appeared behind it with a confused look on her face.

"Agents," she said, "how may I help you?"

Dean glanced at Sam again. "Well, first you can explain to me why you didn't tell us that Beth isn't really your daughter," he pressed, watching color drain from her face.

She stepped aside. "Please come in."

Dean stepped inside, and Sam followed, and when she closed the door, they both turned to face her with expectant looks on their face.

"Well?" Dean asked.

"Beth _is_ my daughter," she told them, adding, "Jimmy and I adopted her about six years ago."

"What happened to her biological parents?" Sam asked.

Melinda stepped further into the hotel room where couches and two chairs were setting opposite each other, and Sam and Dean followed her, facing her silently as she continued. "We don't know," she answered somewhat rehearsed. "They never told us. She was in foster care when we met her, and she needed a home. So we gave her ours. Was that wrong?"

Dean leaned forward, looking over Melinda's face as she fidgeted slightly. "Is there a reason why you didn't tell us? That's something we really should've known before."

"Jimmy didn't think it was important," she insisted. "We took care of Beth for six years. She was ours. And now she's gone."

Dean looked at Sam curiously.

"Ms. Mason," Sam said. "We're going to find Beth. Any information you can give us, even if you don't think it's important, will help."

"What do you mean, she's gone?" Dean asked. "You sound like you know something's happened to her other than being kidnaped."

She continued to fidget, wringing her hands tightly. "I'm sorry," she said rising and moving to the door. "I think you should go now."

Sam looked at Dean, and together they stood up to follow her.

"Do you want us to find your daughter?" Dean asked, concerned over her lack of emotion.

"Of course I do," she exclaimed. "What kind of mother would I be if I didn't?"

"Ms. Mason, where's your husband?" Sam asked.

"He's out," she said simply. She opened the door. "Now, please. Just go."

Sam looked at Dean again, and even though they still didn't have a clue what was going on, they obliged her just this once, stepping out of the room just before she shut the door. Dean sighed angrily, moving down the hall to the elevator.

"Now I know she's hiding something," he told Sam. "We need to check her and her husband out, and I still want to talk to the boyfriend."

Sam looked at his watch. "One-thirty," he said. "I'll see what I can find out about the parents. You go talk to the kid. He's probably still at school."

* * *

Dean was able to find out what school Beth Mason went to before he headed over while Sam pooled all of his computer skills at the hotel to find out everything he could about James and Melinda Mason. Lafayette High School was only ten minutes from the hotel, and on the way, Dean checked all of his information. He'd done this so many times it was like breathing, and at this point, he wanted to be ready for anything. More importantly, he wanted to know what the hell was going on in this town. He wanted to know for sure if this was the little girl they'd save ten years ago, and he wanted to know what had taken her. If anything, he was sure the boyfriend would know. More like he was hoping the boyfriend would know.

Lafayette High School was the oldest high school in Buffalo, and it looked it on the outside with turn of the century brickwork on the outside and tarnished steeples atop the structure. It took Dean a lot of work to find the front office, but as soon as he did, he looked around to make sure class was in session before he took out his badge and stepped into the office to find a middle-aged brown-haired woman in glasses whose name appeared to be Betty. She looked up to see him there, and Dean flashed her a smile before he stepped forward and held up his badge.

"Good afternoon, ma'am," he greeted, "I'm Special Agent Dean Gamble. I'm here about Beth Mason's disappearance."

The smile that had started to form on her face faded, and she folded her hands in front of her. "That's such a horrible situation."

He nodded. "Yes, ma'am. I just have a few questions for you, if you have time, Betty."

"Oh, of course," she insisted. "I'll help you in any way I can, Agent Gamble."

"Did you see Beth the day she disappeared?" he inquired putting his badge away.

Betty nodded. "She was at school that day."

"Did you see anything strange that day?" he asked as he leaned over the desk in front of her.

"Strange?" she repeated.

"Yes, ma'am. Was anyone following her? Did anyone come in looking for her? Did she seem okay that day?"

She looked away, appearing to think over his questions. "Um, well, I don't think anyone was following her. Not that I saw. Beth works in the office just after lunch, and no one came around asking for her. I mean, she was with Sullivan most of the day."

He stood up straight. "Who's Sullivan?"

Betty blushed, chuckling. "Well, that's her boyfriend. Sullivan Travis. He's on the football team."

Dean reached into his jacket pocket, pulling out the photo he'd taken from Beth's room and showing it to Betty. "Is this him?" he asked her, knitting his eyebrows together.

She smiled as her eyes lit up. "Oh, yes. They've been dating about eight months."

Dean thought about everything he'd seen in Beth's room, switching modes slightly. "How long has Beth been going to school here?"

"About four years," she answered with a nod. "She started here when she was 12, almost thirteen."

"And when did she meet Sullivan?" he asked, putting the photo back in his jacket pocket.

"About a year ago," she nodded. "He was a transfer from Albany."

"Any chance I could talk to Sullivan?"

"Oh, of course. He's probably in the gym."

Dean smiled. "Thank you, ma'am."

He bowed his head and turned to leave the office.

"Sullivan's a nice boy," Betty added before Dean could leave. "He was really protective of Beth. I'm sure he'll want to help in any way he can."

Dean started to speak, but he stopped himself, smiling and nodding.

He found his way to the gym, thinking over everything the secretary had told him and wondering how it added up. If this was really a girl they'd saved before, then how had she ended up here? None of this was making any sense, and Dean didn't like it when things didn't make any sense. It always led to things going wrong and people getting killed. That was never a good thing in Dean's book.

He recognized Sullivan the moment he entered the gym, and he moved around the basketball court to where the gym teacher was standing with a clip board and a stop watch. There were about twenty-five boys on the court, scrimmaging and running drills. Dean could still remember that job he and Sam had done where he'd had to pretend to be a gym teacher, and at that thought, he grinned. Then the guy with the stop watch saw him, and he snapped back into his hunter mode. He had work to do. He could reminisce later.

"Who are you?" the guy asked him.

Dean pulled out his badge and showed it to the guy. "Special Agent Dean Gamble," he announced. "And you are?"

"Coach Abel Garrison," he greeted, and Dean reached for his hand. "What can I do for you today, Special Agent?"

"I'm here about the disappearance of Beth Mason. I need to talk to one of your students, Sullivan Travis."

"Beth's boyfriend?" Coach Garrison asked.

Dean nodded. "Apparently."

Coach Garrison pulled out his whistle and blew on it sharply. "Travis!" he shouted, and Sullivan turned around from the middle of his scrimmage. "Make it quick!"

Instantly, Sullivan jogged to where they were, stopping just short of the boundary line. "Yeah, Coach?"

"This is Special Agent Dean Gamble, with the FBI," Coach Garrison gestured to Dean. "He needs to have a few words with you about Beth."

Sullivan looked at Dean, glancing at his coach before he nodded and followed Dean away from the court into the stands so they could be alone for a few minutes.

"So," Dean said once they were sat down. "You and Beth, huh? She's really pretty."

Sullivan tilted his head curiously. "Yeah. She is. But what's that got to do with what happened?"

"How old are you?" Dean asked, dodging the question easily.

"I'm gonna be eighteen in three months."

"And Beth was sixteen?"

Sullivan sat up straight. "Yeah. So?"

Dean leaned closer. "She was sixteen," he repeated.

"It wasn't like that," Sullivan insisted. "I love Beth. I have since the day I met her. And it was okay with her parents."

"You mean her adoptive parents?" Dean interjected.

"Well, yeah, but how did you know she was adopted? I didn't find out until last week."

Dean tried to brush it off. "Lucky guess," he grinned. "So how was Beth acting when she told you she was adopted?"

"She was fine, I guess. She said it was when she was ten after her real parents died."

"And did she know how her parents — I mean, her real parents — died?" Dean asked hoping it would actually be that easy.

"No," Sullivan said, confused. "Well, she said she didn't want to talk about it. She said it wasn't a good time for her, and I didn't want to upset her." He paused, looking around. "Why would Beth's disappearance have anything to do with how her parents died?"

"She never wanted to talk about it?" Dean asked, again dodging the question easily.

Sullivan shook his head. "She told me she wanted to remember them in a good way," he shrugged. "Beth never really talked about it. I mean, before she told me she was adopted. And there was never anything really wrong with her. She never acted strange when I was around. Do you think that has anything to do with her disappearance?"

"It's possible," Dean shrugged. "We're still investigating. When did Beth tell you about her adoption?"

"Friday," he said. "Like I said. Last week."

_The day she disappeared,_ Dean thought.

"Were you the last person she saw before she disappeared that night?" Dean asked, more straightforward than he ever had.

That made Sullivan uncomfortable, and Dean could tell immediately, making a note of the flicker of fear in Sullivan's green eyes. He remembered it from something before, but he couldn't quite place it.

"Well, I was at her house that night," Sullivan stated, rehearsed the same way Beth's mother's response had been. "We had dinner, and Beth and I watched a movie in her room. But then I went home. It was after eleven, and like you said, she's sixteen."

Dean decided to push his luck, leaning in a little closer and lowering his voice. "Come on, Casanova. She's a pretty girl. You're a good-looking guy. Are you sure you just watched a movie? I mean, seriously?"

Sullivan furrowed his eyebrows. "Of course, we watched a movie. Her mom checked on us before ten. Then they turned in. Listen, I told you, it's not like that. I — "

"Yeah, I know. You love Beth. I get it. I loved a girl once." Dean paused, grinning. "Maybe twice."

"That's rude," Sullivan told Dean. "Beth's not that kind of girl."

"Eventually, they're all that kind of girl," Dean chuckled.

"That's enough," Sullivan shouted, and that made Dean smile even more.

"Hold it there, cowboy," Dean soothed. "There's no need to get rowdy. I'm just tryin' to get the whole picture here. And your girlfriend is kind of missing."

"Beth is a really nice girl," Sullivan stated clenching and unclenching his fists. "And she doesn't deserve to be talked about like that. I know she's missing. And I'm done talking to you," he hissed, rising to leave.

He was a bleacher section away when Dean stood up and called after him. "Thank you," he said with a small grin.

Sullivan glared, continuing on down the bleachers to make it back to the basketball court, and Dean watched, remembering every detail of their conversation and knowing something seriously messed up was going on.

He didn't say anything to the coach as he left, moving around the side of the school to where he'd parked the car and pulling out his phone to call Sam. Hopefully, his brother had been able to find out a few things about James and Melinda Mason. The wife at least had some more to tell them, and it was possible the husband did too. Surely, the reason why they'd never told anyone that she was adopted.

That was another thing. How had she been adopted in the first place? What had happened to her birth parents? Dean seriously needed to know the answers to those questions, and most importantly, he wanted to know where Beth Mason was. He wanted to know who she was, and he wanted to know how Sullivan Travis was connected to all of this. What teenage boy could sit in his girlfriend's bedroom without at least getting a little action out of her? Even if she was a good girl.

"Yeah, Dean?" Sam answered.

"You got anything on the Masons?"

Sam scoffed. "Well, they're not saints," he began. "But that's another story. What did you find out from the boyfriend?"

Dean grinned. "His name is Sullivan Travis, and he loved his girlfriend. He was also the last person to see her before she disappeared. And he got just a little more interesting if the way he reacted when I started talking about her is any indication."

"You think he knows anything?" Sam asked.

"I think that's a very good possibility. And I also think there's something wrong with a guy who doesn't make a move on his very beautiful girlfriend even if she is only sixteen. I mean, seriously, it's not like he's saving himself for her or something — "

Dean stopped on the last word, suddenly remembering something from a job they'd done ten years earlier — when they'd saved Mary. Pure. Virgin. Ritual. "Sam," he said after only a few seconds. "We need Cas. And we need to talk to Beth's adoptive parents."

"Well, that's part of the story," Sam said. "It's not just Beth."

Dean paused as he got to the car. "What else could there possibly be?"

Sam inhaled, sighing loudly. "Her name is Annabeth," he revealed. The hair on the back of Dean's neck stood on end. "Annabeth Miller."

Dean barely hesitated. "I'm on my way," he said turning off his phone and getting in the car to get back to the motel.

* * *

"So," Sam began as he and Dean sat at the table in their motel room, "James and Melinda Mason are originally from Andover, Massachusetts. They moved to New York State exactly ten years ago, and guess where they moved to."

"Not Buffalo?" Dean guessed.

"Not at first, no. They actually moved to Highland. Which we've been before. We were there —"

"Ten years ago," Dean finished.

"Yep. And get this — they had a son when they moved there. He was six. Just like Annabeth was when we left her there. James was a circuit court lawyer, and Melinda was a secretary in the same office. They didn't leave a forwarding address, no two-weeks notice, nothing. They just picked up and left."

"So what happened to their son?" Dean asked.

Sam shook his head. "Don't know. They never enrolled him in school. They never took him to a doctor. It was like he vanished."

"I'm guessing he didn't run away from home or get into the wrong car at the supermarket one day," Dean offered.

"Well, I found a birth certificate. No death certificate."

"And where does this connect with Annabeth? What happened to her parents?"

"That's where it starts to get interesting. I found obituaries for both of them. They died in a single car accident just outside of Highland. And three months after we were there. I found a police report. Only one set of tire tracks on the scene. But Annabeth was in the car with them when it happened. She was in the hospital for a little while before Children and Family Services stepped in. The, uh, Masons, if that's really their name, were already foster parents when they moved into town, and they graciously offered to take her in while CPS looked for other family members."

"But none were found," Dean guessed appropriately.

Sam shook his head. "Nope. But it's a lengthy process to become a foster parent. There are classes you have to take, forms to fill out, inspections you have to pass. And the Masons never took in another foster child in the four years they had Annabeth in their home."

Dean leaned in closer. "Say that again?"

Sam sighed softly. "Oh, yeah, the Masons were Annabeth's foster parents for four years before they adopted her. I guess Mrs. Mason forgot to mention that."

Dean cursed. "Son of a bitch," he hissed.

"It gets better," Sam said. "They lived in Buffalo for two years before they enrolled Annabeth in school. They never took her to a doctor or the emergency room. Kind of makes you wonder exactly what they were doing for two years."

"So they'd had her with them this whole time?" Dean asked confusingly. "From her accident to a week ago?"

"Looks like it. What I don't understand is why they lied in the first place. I mean, other than the strange timeline, there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with them."

Dean had heard enough, rising from his chair and shouting. "Cas! Get your angelic ass down here right now! It's confession time!"

"Dean, seriously," Sam scoffed. "Does he ever come when we —"

"I was in the middle of something, Dean," Cas stated monotonously as he appeared less than two feet from where Sam was sitting.

Sam jumped out of his chair, obviously not expecting the angel to come, but Dean was un-phased, moving closer to Cas whom he hadn't seen in almost two weeks.

"Yeah, well, this is important," Dean griped. "This is about Mary."

Cas said nothing, but Sam shook his head. "Dean, we don't know that for sure," he argued.

"Yeah, but Cas is going to tell us everything he knows about Annabeth Miller's disappearance. You remember her, right? She was kidnaped about ten years ago to be used in a ritual that we stopped."

"I'm aware of who she is," Cas informed Dean. "I'm also aware of the fact that she went missing six days ago. But I'm not aware of any foul play involved in her disappearance."

"Well, do you know who took her?" Sam asked, glancing at Dean.

"Not at this time. But we're looking into it."

"Who's we?" Dean demanded. "And why didn't you tell us about this?"

"It wasn't known who her attacker was, and I didn't see a reason to alarm you without answers since you have a tendency to demand them without due cause."

"This is about Mary, Cas!" Dean shouted. He exhaled, working to calm himself before he stepped away from Cas to pace the floor. "Is Annabeth the first one to disappear?"

Cas hesitated, and Sam stepped closer to the Angel. "Is she the first one this time?"

"No," Cas stated unsympathetically. "There have been two others. But as I said, we're looking into it. It's unlikely this is a coincidence, but we don't know anything for certain. They've just disappeared."

"We killed Lilith," Sam stated despite the fear in his voice. "For good. And Mary's nineteen. She's an adult. They can't hurt her anymore."

"She might be of the age where she can participate in the voting process in your society," Cas assured Sam, "but she's not considered matured until her body physically stops growing. That won't happen until she's 22."

"Why didn't you tell us this?" Dean demanded again. "If she's not safe, then —"

"She's safe," Cas said certainly.

"And you know this how?" Sam asked, steadily growing angrier by the second.

"Because we've been watching her for some time."

"You and who?" Dean yelled.

"Me," they heard and turned to see the one person they didn't think they would ever see again.

"Michael," Sam nearly choked out.

"Good to see you too, boys," he smirked, not looking a day older than he had the last time Dean had seen him. "It's been a while."

"Apparently not for you," Dean glared. "What are you doing watching Mary? If she's safe. And why didn't you tell us this was happening?"

Michael moved closer to where they were all standing. "I'm watching Mary to keep her safe," he informed Dean. "And there was no need to involve you unless it was absolutely necessary — which it still isn't despite what you've already discovered."

"She's our family," Sam argued. "We had a right to know. Does she know you're watching her?"

"Of course she knows," Michael soothed.

Dean fought the calm sensation attempting to move its way through his chest. "Oh, don't try to work your mojo junk on us," Dean warned. "What do you know?" he demanded, looking at Cas again.

Cas looked at Michael, and when the former Archangel bowed his head, Dean bellowed. "Tell us what you know," he commanded.

"Watch your tone, Dean," Michael pressed calmly. "You don't want me to lose my patience, and it waning enough as it is."

"What's going on?" Sam pleaded. "Is she in danger?"

"No," Cas insisted. "She and Adam are safe. But you need to talk to James and Melinda Mason. Now."

"Why?" Dean shouted.

"Because they're a part of this," Cas revealed somewhat ominously. "And they aren't exactly what they seem."

"What are they?" Sam asked, but Cas and Michael disappeared before an answer could be squeezed out of them.

Dean cursed again, taking out his cell phone and dialing quickly. He brought the phone to his ear, listening to it ring once and then twice. "Oh, come on, Adam, answer your phone," he grumbled.

No answer came, and Dean shut off his phone. "Shit."

This was not good. First this girl disappears, and now they knew two others had gone missing. Dean wondered if it was two of the other five girls they'd saved ten years earlier. Was this even possible? And now they learned that Michael had been hanging around for a lot longer than they'd even realized. What was he doing watching Mary? Wasn't there enough already going on it the world to warrant his attention?

"We should get back to the hotel," Sam said a little frantically. "If the Masons are involved in this, they could skip town before we get another chance."

Dean didn't argue, moving around to where he'd set their bags for the night. He didn't say anything as he and Sam left their motel to get back to the hotel the Masons were checked into, but he swore on his own life that he was gonna get to the bottom of this even if it was the last thing he did.

* * *

This time, when they went to the Masons' hotel, they went in through the back entrance, doing everything they possibly could to avoid being seen since it was very likely they were either going to find a ransacked room or a crime scene. While they weren't new to those by any means, they'd had their fair share of dealing the real cops in town, and Dean could honestly say he'd had his fill until he either died a horrible death or retired when he couldn't keep his own drool from dribbling down his chin.

It was almost five o'clock when they made it, and Dean led the way to the service elevator so they could make their way to the floor the Masons were supposed to be staying on. In his jacket pocket, he had his most trusted automatic, and just in case, he had the key card he'd swiped from earlier. In the last ten years, technology really had made their job a lot harder, but Dean figured they'd always adapt. It was the way of the job.

The floor was void of any other person when they stepped off the elevator, and with a turn to the right, they eased down the corridor toward the Masons' room. The door was locked, just as Dean had expected, and he pulled out the card to open it without resorting to anything excessive. Sam followed him into the room, and upon entering the hotel room, the first thing they both noticed was the lights off.

"Watch where you step," Dean told Sam, pulling out his gun and moving toward the bedroom.

The room smelled strange, like rotten eggs and burnt toast. It made Dean gag the closer he got to the bedroom, and he used his elbow to open the door as he glanced back to see Sam easing around the living room area. Dean sighed heavily, looking into the bedroom and seeing something he hadn't seen in years as the bodies of James and Melinda Mason laid over the floor of the bedroom covered in blood. It didn't look like they'd been dead long, and he didn't understand what was smelling so bad, but the closer he got, the more he understood.

Mrs. Mason had something in her hand, and Dean knelt to her side, careful not to touch her or the blood as he pulled the object out of her hand. It was a cell phone, and he quickly scrolled through the calls on it before he noticed a voice mail saved. He moved through the menu, getting to the message and playing it as he lifted the phone to his ear.

"_You were warned."_

The message ended then, and Dean looked at Mrs. Mason, wondering exactly what she'd been involved in.

"Hey, Dean, I think I found something," Sam called from the living room.

He stood up slowly, moving around the Mr. Mason's side and looking over his body but not seeing anything before he left quickly to find Sam. "Yeah," he called back. "I found something too," he told Sam, looking up and seeing Sam in front of the cabinet against the wall. "James and Melinda Mason are dead," Dean reported, stepping up in front of the cabinet and instantly knowing what Sam had found.

There inside the cabinet was one of the largest altars for summoning and communicating with Demons that Dean had ever seen in his life. There were herbs, blood, candles, amulets, and even a few demonic symbols carved into the back of the cabinet. But that wasn't all he saw. He took out his flashlight, shining it inside the cabinet and knowing his suspicions had been correct as he discovered a small cassette tape buried among the demonic paraphernalia.

"What's that?" Sam asked softly, and outside the room, several loud clicks sounded off signaling they were no longer on the floor alone.

"Later," Dean whispered, closing the cabinet and moving Sam off to a corner of the room less than five seconds before the door to the room opened and allowed in a tall, dark-haired man by himself.

They watched him move toward the bedroom, and as quickly as they could, Dean pushed Sam out of the room and then back down the hall toward the service elevator. Aside from the two of them, the hall was empty, and the doors were opening just as the man came into the hall and looked in their direction. Dean got a pretty decent look at him, and he shoved Sam onto the elevator thinking they were going to be followed. But whoever this man was, he didn't seem to care that Dean and Sam looked very suspicious getting onto the service elevator even though he didn't say anything or even do anything. He didn't even follow them.

Dean got onto the elevator, replacing his gun and his flashlight before he pulled his phone out again.

"Yeah?"

"Bobby, we need you to call Mary and Adam. Something's happened, and we have to meet."

"Well, what's goin' on, Dean? Last thing you told me was never to call him."

"This is serious, Bobby. It's — This is about her safety, okay? Just call him. I can't get him to answer the phone, and I can't call her. Sam and me, we're on our way."

"All right. See ya later."

* * *

_**One year ago . . .**_

_I found her,_ was the only message that was needed for them to know it was time. And instantly, they met each other at the designated place that had been chosen years before any of them had been born. It was pure instinct that brought them to this place, along with a deep-rooted ability that had been afforded to them upon birth — the ability to find the one thing that would unite them forever.

Though they all had been born with brown hair and green eyes as a mark of their birthright, they all had distinctive appearances meant to bring about a certain reaction. While their female counterparts usually dealt with small children and infants, their purpose was aimed toward a more mature target, and it was for this reason they had to take certain oaths that would ensure they appeared as they should to their prey. It wasn't meant to entice or seduce, at least not until the time was right. For a short time, they were only meant to make contact, to bond and protect until the signs told them it was time.

That time was now.

"Are you sure it's her?" the oldest asked, and he looked at his brother who'd found her in the sea of humans polluting the land they walked.

"Of course," the brother stated incredulously, his green eyes flaring indignantly. Despite his younger appearance, his stature was nothing short of demanding. "I know her smell. I know it better than my own."

"Then we have work to do," the second oldest insisted. "And we can't let this opportunity pass. After what happened last time — "

"That isn't happening again," the oldest assured him, looking at the brother who'd found her. "Have you made contact?"

"No, but she's seen me. I have to be careful. She has a guy with her."

"We'll take care of him," the youngest brother stated, a sly grin easing over his face.

"No," the oldest pressed. "We can't let anyone know about us. Our existence is perilous enough without Angels and Hunters knowing we're still around. They've already killed several of us who aren't smart enough to have a plan. I'm sick of dealing with a house of cards."

"And exactly what is the plan?" the brother who'd found her, who was next to youngest, asked.

The oldest held his gaze for several seconds. "First, we make a contact her. We must be certain of her identity and her heritage. Once that's finished, we'll have to begin the ritual again. I'll come with you in case she has company."

"I don't need a babysitter," he grumbled.

"But you're young and impetuous," the oldest reminded him. "She's not to be meddled with. It's why we lost Eleanor. You have to be careful with her. So I'll go with you."

He exhaled annoyingly, and the second eldest spoke despite this.

"The process will take longer this time," he said of the ritual. "He'll have to work harder to earn her trust if she's been with one of them this long. She'll know to look for signs of possession and death. But at least we do have one advantage Eleanor didn't."

He glanced at the youngest, who was smiling, and then they both looked at the youngest. "Of course," the oldest nodded. "For now, we'll be careful. Once we have confirmation, we'll get the list and start the process of elimination again." He nodded to the brother who'd found her. "We'll go now. The less time we wait, the sooner we can begin."

He stepped closer to his brother, taking his shoulder and disappearing from the meeting place instantly. The second oldest looked at the youngest, and together, they disappeared to their respective waiting places until they had approval to begin. It had been nine years since this had been possible, and even if the circumstances were different, one thing was certain.

The wait was over.

* * *

**Well, if you've gotten all the way down there, then you haven't gotten totally lost by the timeline, and I can't promise it won't get a little worse before it gets better. We're still going to be in the future, or whatever, in the next chapter, but a year before this chapter began. You've been warned.**

**And if you remember the story from 'Resurrection,' then you'll recognize a few things sprinkled throughout this chapter and a lot of the chapters to follow. Just little things I put in there to see if you're paying attention.**

**So I'll leave you to it, and if you can, don't forget to tell me what you think. And as mentioned previously, I'll be re-editing 'Resurrection' to take out all the typos and such, but it'll be a slow-going process. Bear with me.**

**Other than that, I hope you've enjoyed, and I'll see you on the next run!  
**


	3. Seduction 1

**Okay, so I know I haven't updated in a reeeeaaaalllly long time, and all I can attest to is life. It happens. And I've been working hard on this chapter to make it as good as I possibly can.**

**First things first, this one starts a little bit before the end of the last chapter. Remember that "One year ago" part. We're right around then. And with this chapter, and the one just after it, which is sort of a second half, we'll see what's been going on with the other Winchesters for that amount of time. And if you've been keeping up, you should know who that is.**

**Also, again, this is a sequel, and therefore, we won't be covering anything that's happening in Season Six. I can't believe Cas! Working with Crowley! But I still love him anyway.**

**So that's about it for this one. **

**Now, go on! Read!  
**

* * *

**Two**

**Seduction**

**One Year Ago . . . **_**Laramie, Wyoming**_

The first time she saw him, he was alone, sitting in a booth across the diner from her with a thick book in his hands. From where she was sitting, it looked nearly as big as a phone book for a major city. There was no way he was actually reading it. Though he was sitting down, he looked tall, nearly as tall as Adam, and his hair was unruly and light brown — almost like light gold. She couldn't see his eyes. He was looking through the book so intently she supposed it was possible for him to be reading such a large book.

He had to be new around here. She'd never seen him before even though that wasn't really saying much. She'd only lived nearby about six months, but she came into town every day. She kinda had to. She would go out of her mind if she stayed in the house with Adam more than a few hours at a time. She loved Adam, really, but he'd been taking care of her since she'd been nine, and she wasn't a little girl anymore. She drove and played poker and pool just as often as he did, and she knew how to pull her own weight. He knew that too. He just trouble admitting she was grown up — or as grown-up as he'd been when all this started for him. They'd been on the move for almost nine years. She didn't have any friends — except for Cas, but he was angel, and that kind of made him geographically undesirable as a friend.

After six months, she'd become accustomed to certain things — like the diner. It was the first thing she saw when she got into town, and she stopped there every day to get something to eat. She always had money, but after a little while, the waitress behind the front counter — Barbara — had started giving her a free plate, stating "you're about as regular here as a bowl of oatmeal. Keep your money for college." She never had the heart to tell Barbara that college wasn't in her near future. The only thing she had planned for right now was staying alive. That didn't mean she couldn't hold her own against any other high school graduate her age, but it just wasn't in the cards for her right now. In fact, if Sam had anything to say about it with all those crazy assignments he would send her, she could beat the ass off every college graduate within a two-hundred-mile radius of her — and on any given day.

She'd asked Barbara about this new patron after seeing him in the same booth five days in a row, but the woman who seemed to know everything about everyone had no idea who he was. That led to an incredibly awkward first meeting. She might've smelled like cow dung for the cold response she got out of him, and the next one was even worse. She was curious and persistent. And after a week, he finally opened up to her. It was like a switch had been flipped. But he wasn't alone anymore.

For the last week or so, he'd had another man with him who looked about Adam's age, and even though he'd been just as nice, he kind of creeped her out.

"I thought you were old enough to be out without a chaperone," she commented as they walked through town with his companion a few feet behind him like a Secret Service man.

"Oh, don't mind Donovan. He's my brother," he explained. "He's just looking after me."

"Well, I have a brother," she added carefully, "but he trusts me. Most of the time." At that, she smiled.

"Does it bother you that he looks out for me?" he asked, his voice turning concerned.

"When you put it like that, no, but it's like he thinks I'm going to do something horrible to you."

The next day, Donovan was gone.

After a couple of weeks of it being just the two of them, she felt the need to get a few formalities out of the way.

"Keiran," she said, "I want you to meet my brother. Adam."

"You do?" he asked, sounding like he'd never expected her to say that to him.

"Well, yeah," she insisted. "I know your family. I want you to meet mine."

He smiled for the first time in three weeks, and she couldn't believe how amazing it made him look. "I would love to," he agreed.

* * *

The first meeting with Adam did not go well at all, especially with him asking the stupidest questions to get a certain response out of Keiran. It was worse that Mary really had no way of stopping him. She knew he was only looking out for her, and she knew his reasons were much more noble than anyone else's who would follow their brother through the streets of a small town. But it was still annoying.

"Mary tells me you're new in town," Adam said as they all sat at the diner in their usual booth. "How new are you?"

Mary sighed heavily as she sat in the booth with Adam, lifting apologetic eyes to their guest. He smiled graciously.

"We just got into town a few weeks ago," he answered willingly.

"You and your brother?" Adam asked, his voice filled with suspicion.

"Yes," Keiran answered with a nod.

"So where are your parents?"

"Adam," she exclaimed, "I didn't want you to meet him so you could interrogate him!"

"It's okay," Keiran allowed. "My parents were killed in a car accident about nine years ago. My brother Donovan was old enough to take custody of me, and we've been moving around ever since."

"Does your brother not have a regular job?"

He lifted his eyes to Mary's, and for a brief second or two, his eyes flashed bright green. In an instant, Mary was overwhelmed with the strangest vision — one she hadn't been haunted by since she'd been eight years old.

"He's a freelance photographer," Keiran answered with a nod in Adam's direction. "We move when his assignment is finished."

"And exactly what assignment is your brother doing around here?" Adam asked, glancing at Mary and somehow berating her for not thinking ahead about this situation. "We're in the middle of nowhere."

"That was part of his assignment," Keiran replied smoothly. "Small town life. Places forgotten by the progression of technology. I've been helping him, and you'd be surprised the things he's found worth . . . documenting."

Adam scoffed softly, motioning for Barbara to come to the table. "I doubt there's much interest in this place," he argued. "Laramie isn't exactly famous for anything."

"Adam, that's not very nice," Mary interrupted. "No one's ever asked you about what you do or why. It's not fair to question the way someone else lives. Keiran, I'm sorry. I know I said Adam trusts me, but sometimes, he forgets I can take care of myself."

Adam opened his mouth to speak but was interrupted by Barbara as she brought three more glasses of water. As of yet, there was no food on the table. Mary was quickly losing her appetite, and all she really wanted right now was to get away from Adam's overprotectiveness.

"You all look hungry," Barbara commented. "I can get you three specials. No charge."

Mary opened her mouth, but Keiran spoke before she could.

"That sounds wonderful," he agreed, glancing at her and grinning crookedly. Somehow, she became hungry without realizing it, and she looked at Barbara, nodding.

"That does sound good," she amended.

Barbara looked at Adam, giving him what could only be described as an evil eye before he grudgingly agreed.

"All right, fine," he yielded. "Three specials."

Barbara nodded. "Comin' right up."

It was quiet for a minute or two, and Keiran drank his water silently before looking at Adam pointedly.

"So, what are you doing in town?" he asked. "Mary said you've been here over six months."

Adam sat back and folded his arms stubbornly over his chest. "I'm a writer," he offered as his cover story, the fourth or fifth he'd come up with so far. "And I don't like staying in the same place for very long. I guess I'm a lot like your brother. I go where the assignments take me, except I make the assignments myself."

Keiran smiled again, bowing his head. "Of course. But surely, it can't be easy on Mary. Not being able to make friends or roots. Isn't she old enough to look after herself? To go where she wants."

"Well, a lot like you," Adam stated plainly, "our parents died when she was young, and it's my job to take care of her. I don't hold her here with me. She stays because she knows I can keep her safe."

"From what?" Keiran asked with a chuckle.

"From you," Adam said bluntly. "And other guys like you. Blowing into town and targeting the first girl who shows you the slightest bit of attention. Thinking you can wedge yourself between her and her family so you can manipulate her into thinking I'm trapping her. And I wonder if you and your brother even care about the fact that it's wrong to do something like that."

"That's enough," Mary exclaimed, causing them both to look at her. "I'm not a little girl or an invalid. I'm not blind or stupid. Can't the two of you find something else to talk about? Please? The weather. Sports. The horror movie revival at the theater! Anything. Change the subject now, or I'm leaving. And the two of you can argue about ulterior motives until you both go blue in the face."

Adam bowed his head, exhaling sharply and glancing at Mary. "Sorry. I just don't want you to get hurt," he reiterated. "You know that."

Mary laid her hand over his shoulder. "I know. And we've talked about this. I know what to do." She looked at Keiran. "And I love my brother. He's taken care of me the last nine years. He's my family, and I don't feel smothered by him. I didn't mean to imply that I do."

Keiran also bowed his head. "Of course," he said again. "It was wrong of me to presume anything of a situation I know nothing about. It won't happen again."

"Okay," Mary said, sitting up straight as she relaxed and smiling slightly as Barbara brought a plate of biscuits to the table.

After that, the "meeting" was exceptionally personable and even a little overly nice as both Adam and Keiran avoided talking about the one thing they clearly wanted to talk about, and even though Mary was a little more than annoyed by the end of dinner, she was glad Adam had accepted what she'd said.

She knew what was at stake, especially since she'd been told about it every day for the last several years of her life. She knew she wasn't safe without Adam, and she knew why. It wasn't just because she was a girl, and it wasn't just because she was young. She was different from everyone else around her, and she was constantly reminded of it whenever she began to attract attention from people who saw the thing in her that was different.

But Mary hadn't made a real friend since she was ten years old. She hadn't known a real home in nine years, and simply referring to Adam as her home wasn't enough anymore. She'd never had a boyfriend or gone on a date. She'd never even kissed a boy before, and it was starting to take its toll on her feminine side. She couldn't pretend she was okay with this arrangement anymore, and it wasn't good enough for Adam to keep saying he just wanted to keep her safe. She knew he would do everything he could to keep her safe. He always had. And she knew he always would, but it just wasn't enough anymore.

After dinner, Adam reluctantly left Mary with Keiran so he could go back to house to run sweeps of the town for any unusual activity, and even though he disguised it as "research," Mary was glad he doing something to keep himself busy. Once she and Keiran were alone, she was surprised to find she didn't want the night to end, and she thought of the first thing she could to keep it going.

"The theater really is showing a horror movie revival this week," she said as they walked from the diner closer to the center of town. "I know the ticket booth guy. He can get us a good deal."

Keiran smiled then. "Is it safe to think I'm not the only one who doesn't want to go home?" He asked.

Mary blushed. "Maybe," she said softly.

"Horror movies?" He verified.

"From the thirties and forties," she nodded. "I've seen a few of them. Not very scary, but nostalgic, I guess."

"Then I would love to," he agreed.

Experimentally, Mary wrapped her hand around his upper arm, and he looked at her with a crooked grin a few seconds before she lowered her hand down his arm to his hand. Gently, he linked his fingers between hers, and Mary felt something she'd never felt before. She'd only known Keiran a couple of months, but she liked spending time with him, and it was obvious he liked spending time with her. She hoped they could keep doing this, and it looked like he wanted it too. Mary had never had a boyfriend. She wondered if it was too soon to think she had one now.

The theater house was one of those old buildings with the ticket booth out front and the concessions inside, and when Mary talked to the box office guy, he easily gave her two discounted tickets to _Doomed to Die_. There weren't that many people in the theater, and Mary found a seat close to the back since the screen wasn't the massive kind in modern theaters in the bigger cities. She liked coming to this theater since she could talk to guys in the film booth to play pretty much anything she wanted. There was something to be said about being inquisitive and new in town. Her newness had yet to wear off. She hoped it never did.

Halfway through the movie, Keiran draped his arm over the back Mary's seat without doing any of the normal "moves" most boys did to make it look natural for them to do what they'd just done. To Mary, it wasn't unnatural for him to put his arm around her. In fact, the longer he had his arm around her, the more natural it felt. He reached for her hand then, and she reciprocated easily, linking her fingers with his and laying her head over his shoulder. It didn't feel awkward, and it didn't seem too new for her to be so comfortable with him. It felt normal. And even though Mary had no comparison for what she was feeling, she liked it. A lot.

The movie was almost over when Mary lifted her head and looked at Keiran, and he looked at her half a minute before leaning closer until his nose caressed hers gently. His breath was warm and sweet, and his lips came dangerously close to hers before an explosion of sound in the movie startled them both. She giggled then, and he laughed, watching the credits for a minute and then looking at her again.

"It's late," she whispered. "I need to get home."

"I can walk you," he offered.

She didn't hesitate. "Okay."

With that, he took her hand and helped her to her feet, following her out of the theater and then away from the building as the street lamps of the town illuminated the street blocks. It was after nine o'clock, and Mary lived a few miles outside town. She'd walked before, but tonight, it was different. Tonight, she wasn't walking alone.

"Did you like the movie?" Mary asked Keiran as they walked arm in arm down the sidewalk.

"I did," he nodded. "It was very interesting."

She leaned back to look at him, and he turned his eyes to her. "Really?" She asked. "It wasn't bad?"

He shook his head. "No. Of course not. We should do it again."

Mary smiled. "We should," she agreed.

They walked until the sidewalks stopped and turned into rocky paths leading out of town, and even though Mary was sure it would look strange to Keiran for them to be walking in the middle of nowhere in the dark by themselves, he never said anything. He actually held onto her tighter the further away from town they got. Mary was relieved he didn't find it odd that she walked this far away from town by herself, and she thought it was very sweet of him to walk with her when it could've gone the other way entirely.

They were less than half a mile from the house Mary and Adam were staying in when it sounded like they were being followed. It was strange since the area was supposed to be clear of criminals and . . . other things. Mary looked behind them once, seeing the outline of a tall man in heavy clothes less than a hundred feet away, and after that, she urged Keiran to walk faster despite them being on a muddy dirt road four miles outside town.

The footfalls of their follower got closer in an unusually fast manner, and before they got a fourth of the way along the road closer to her house, a fast, blurry shape flew across the dirt road ahead of them. Mary stopped, realizing she didn't have any weapons on her and knowing she couldn't call for Adam. Keiran would think she was crazy for calling him.

"What's going on?" Keiran asked as he looked around and held her closer to him.

"I don't know. Let's just keep walking. My house is less than a quarter mile away."

Together, they both began walked again, only to see another fast, blurry shape fly across the road, closer now than it had been before. They stopped again, and Keiran yelled.

"Who are you? What do you want?"

"Shh," Mary whispered. "That's not safe."

"But we're in the middle of nowhere, alone, and I won't —"

The shape flew at them out of nowhere, knocking Keiran to the ground and grabbing Mary before she could make another sound. Dark trees and foliage flew passed her as the figure carried her through the trees and then suddenly stopped, slamming her against a hard tree and nearly knocking her unconscious. Stars flooded her vision, and the earth began spinning quickly despite her being held in place. Her vision became blurry, and she couldn't make out the figure in front of her. After a few seconds, she could feel his hands on her, and she felt her feet leave the ground.

"Only the best for a daughter of Lilith," the figure whispered to her, his voice raspy and heavy.

Mary felt a new set of chills slide up her spine, and she tried to fight, thinking so intensely about the spells and incantations she'd been taught. She kicked at her attacker, only to get her legs pinned against the tree, and she slammed her fists into his neck and shoulders until her arms were wrenched away and then around the tree. Pain shot up her left arm as the joint in her shoulder slipped out of its socket, and she cried out a few seconds before her attacked punched her in the face.

There was something different about this attacker. He didn't fight like a demon or a revenant. He fought like a . . . human. And he knew she wasn't completely human. When she felt the cold edge of a serrated blade press against her neck, she knew one more thing. She was going to die.

He was knocked away from her suddenly, and she fell to the ground as the figure of Keiran appeared to be fighting this attacker. She was so dizzy, and she could barely see straight. She felt blood trickling down her neck, and she felt an image of her mother flash before her eyes before she passed out, falling to the forest floor instantly.

Gentle fingertips brought Mary from her unconsciousness, and she opened her eyes to see the blurry image of Keiran above her with something red smeared down the right side of his face.

"Mary," he whispered. "Are you okay?"

She grasped onto his hands as he helped her sit up, and her vision cleared to see they were back on the road to her house. She looked at Keiran again, realizing he was bleeding and reaching for his face.

"You're bleeding," she exclaimed.

He squeezed her hands, helping her to her feet. "So are you." Without a word, he lifted her in his arms and continued walking down the dirt road.

"What happened? How did you fight him off?"

He grinned. "Well, I didn't. He hit me with that knife of his, and I guess the two of us were too much trouble. He was gone when I got my bearings back. Did he hurt you?" he asked softly. "I mean, other than when he punched you. I fixed your arm."

Mary knew she was okay because of the protection spell that had been placed on her by Cas over nine years earlier, but she couldn't tell Keiran that. "I'm okay," she assured him.

That appeared to satisfy him, and he held onto her tighter still walking toward her house.

The porch light was on when the house came into view, and Mary sighed softly, knowing Adam was waiting up and hoping he didn't go crazy when he saw her face or her neck. The possibility was low, but she still hoped.

Adam came out the front door before Mary and Keiran were inside the safety of light shining from the enclosed porch, and he looked more worried than she'd seen in nearly four years. Keiran lowered her to the ground, and Mary stepped closer to the front steps as Adam opened the screen door.

"It's almost ten o'clock," Adam reminded her.

"I know," Mary admitted, the right side of her face throbbing as a new abrasion had already begun to form. Adam noticed and pulled her into the house. Keiran followed silently.

"What happened?" Adam demanded, guiding Mary into the kitchen and packing ice into a wash cloth.

"Someone attacked us on the way home," Mary informed Adam, grimacing as he laid the ice over her cheek and turning her eyes to Keiran. "My date fought him off."

Adam glanced at Keiran, finally noticing the cut above his eyebrow and motioning to a chair. "Sit down. I'll get you something to put on that."

Keiran didn't argue, keeping his eyes on Mary as he sat at the table calmly.

Nothing else was said as Adam tended to Mary's cuts and bruises and her shoulder, and when he finished with her, he helped Keiran clean the cut above his eyebrow before applying a set of butterfly strips to it and rubbing a salve on to keep it from hurting.

"Thanks," Keiran said as Adam finished.

"No problem," Adam nodded. "I should probably be thanking you. Mary might be dead now if it wasn't for you. Or gone. Just be careful. I'll be keeping an eye on you."

Mary exhaled loudly from where she was sitting, and Adam rose to face her before he left without saying anything. As soon as he was gone, she moved to sit at the table with Keiran. He grinned sympathetically, and she laughed softly.

"He's warming up to you nicely," she commented, and he laughed.

"I guess that's what we'll call it."

She scooted closer to him until she was next to him, lifting her fingers to his cut and feeling his skin burning as the salve worked to keep him from feeling the pain probably shooting through his skin. "Thank you," she whispered. "For saving my life."

He took her hand from his forehead, keeping it in his and leaning closer to her. "I just had to get to you," he admitted. "I couldn't bear the thought of not seeing you again. I like you, Mary."

She blushed, lowering her eyes to their hands. "I like you too," she confessed.

He laughed softly once, leaning in a few centimeters closer. "I mean, I really like you, Mary."

His face was only an inch from hers, and he squeezed her hand in his as his warm breath caressed her lips. He rubbed the tip of her nose with his, leaning in the last little bit and whispering softly. "I shouldn't," he warned, "but I do," he promised, allowing his lips to touch hers gently.

Mary had never been kissed before, but it seemed like Keiran had kissed before. And he wasn't deterred by her apparent inexperience. In fact, it spurred him on to kiss her more, cradling her lower lip and then closing his upper lip on hers until he was absently licking her lip gently. He linked his fingers between hers as their hands remained connected on the table, and he lowered his other hand to her waist only a few seconds before easing his tongue inside her mouth. Chills slipped up Mary's back, and she leaned back, breathless as she laid her forehead over the bridge of his nose.

"I should go," he whispered sadly. He leaned back and looked at her. "But I'll see you tomorrow?"

Mary felt a swell in her chest as she smiled at him. "Of course you will."

They sat silently for almost a minute before he stood up slowly and pulled her with him. They walked to the front door together, stepping out into the cold Wyoming air and pausing at the front steps of the porch.

"I feel like I should walk you home," she teased.

He lifted his hands to her cheeks, leaning closer and kissing her again. "I'll be fine," he swore. "You'll see me tomorrow. I promise."

"Sleep tight then," she giggled, releasing him and watching him leave before she walked back into the house as Adam revealed himself from under the staircase.

"Did you see him fight your attacker?" he asked her, moving closer and handing her the potion they kept for her from Bobby.

"Sort of," she admitted, drinking a small amount and feeling her head clear from the events of the night. "I hit my head, and it gets fuzzy after that. He carried me to the road, and then here. He put my shoulder back in its socket. Honestly, Adam, if he was going to hurt me, why would he allow himself to get hurt by an attacker?"

"To get on your good side," Adam suggested. "To be your savior. To fool you into thinking he wasn't going to hurt you. There are a hundred different reasons."

"And if we suspect every person who shows me the slightest bit of friendship, we'll alienate everyone we ever meet. He passed all of your tests at dinner. He's not a demon or a ghoul or a vampire or . . . a revenant! He's just a boy, and I like him. And I know how to take care of myself. Please just trust me."

"I do trust you," Adam promised. "But you can be swayed. Cas said so. We have to be careful, and until he passes _The Test_, I'll still be suspicious of him. Because you're all I have, and I'm all you have. I don't want anything to happen to you because we both got careless."

At that, Mary leaned forward and wrapped her arms around Adam — her brother, her protector, her conscience. "I know," she whispered to him. "I love you too."

It was after midnight when Mary finally got into her bathroom to take a shower. Her room was consequently the largest in the house with a bathroom attached to it, and she still thought it was too big. Adam had insisted on her being in here since she was the girl and needed the space despite not having any more things than he did. She had clothes from the last year that still fit her, and she had little trinkets from Sam and Dean strewn around. After Dean had detailed the Impala for the fifth time, he'd found an old Indian nickel in the back seat along with three empty bullet casings from when the Colt had still been a thirteen-bullet gun. All those things were now in Mary's possession.

Her bathroom was fitted with all the things a girl her age needed, and when she stepped inside to take a shower, she stopped by the mirror to look at her face. Her right cheek was already bruised, and the cut on her neck was still oozing from ointment Adam had applied. Her brown hair was mussed in places where she'd gotten knocked against a tree, and there was dirt on her forehead and on her chin. It was good that it had been dark when she'd said good night to Keiran. She looked horrible. She gazed at her own green eyes in the mirror, wondering exactly where the night had gone wrong. If they hadn't been attacked, she wondered if Keiran would have wanted to kiss her.

"No," she said to herself.

With that, she began to undress, stepping back to turn the shower on and then easing inside with regards to her scrapes and bruises. She thought about Keiran while she showered, and she hoped she saw him the next day.

* * *

It was dark when he appeared in the main cavern of their under-dwelling, and upon his arrival, a half dozen candles lit up, illuminating the immediate ritual area as his oldest brother appeared from the shadows alone. The smile on his oldest brother's face told him it had worked to their liking, and even though he was a little disappointed, he did nothing to show it, moving to the center of the circle to face his brother.

"You did well," his oldest brother told him. "This is good news for our cause. Did you advance your pacing?"

"I think I've gained her trust," he informed his oldest brother. "She defended me to her brother, and I think it will be easier to have her alone now."

"Then you'll be tested soon," his oldest brother assured him. "We should prepare for this. Have you made plans?"

He nodded. "For tomorrow."

"Then we should begin tonight."

His oldest brother moved outside the circle, and he looked to the floor, discovering himself in the middle of a pentacle. Inside the five spaces, he saw the symbols of his birthright, and beneath his feet was a new symbol — fire. As was part of the ritual to disassociate himself from his brothers and to prevent being discovered a traitor and infiltrator, he removed his clothes and laid within the circle. His oldest brother chanted the incantation softly, and though he knew every word, he found himself drifting back to her.

He thought of her eyes and her smile and the way her lips felt when he kissed her. He wasn't supposed to think of her, but he couldn't stop himself. He didn't want to. Finally he understood what had happened to Eleanor.

* * *

The next time Mary saw Keiran, it was different from every other time she'd seen him, and it wasn't just because of how he'd saved her or kissed her or touched her. He seemed . . . freer than she'd ever seen him, and there was no longer any mention of his brother Donovan. She wasn't sorry for this fact, but it struck her as odd. She hoped everything was okay, but she didn't pry. He granted her the freedom to have secrets, and it only made sense to give him the same thing.

They didn't go back to the old theater after the first time, but they found other places in town to explore. Mary hadn't really allowed herself to get comfortable since she and Adam were almost always moving within ten or eleven months of arriving, and it was a nice change to have a look at the place where she was staying. She knew it would never be home, but now that she knew Keiran, it felt more like she could have somewhere to come back to. Mary knew he wouldn't be able to come with them when they left, but she liked thinking it every now and then.

Laramie had a branch of the University of Wyoming situated inside it, and she and Keiran went there for exhibits and science seminars even though neither of them had any desire to go to college. Mary was too smart to go to college, and Keiran appeared to know everything he needed to survive. Of course, if they were situated in the balcony of a crowded seminar, it was easier for them to sit next to each other and playfully caress each other's palms where no one could see what they were doing. If they were walked through an art exhibit for Middle English sculptures, it was easier for them to whisper unintelligible things in each other's ears where no one else could hear them. Mary had never known how much fun things like that could be, especially with older, more conservative people looking at them unapprovingly. She didn't care. After another three months of being with Keiran, Mary began to love it.

"You've only known him a few months," Adam argued with her, watching her get ready for her night out with Keiran. "I don't like you being alone with him. What if you're attacked again?"

"I can take care of myself," she assured him. "You always know where I am, and when I'm in trouble, I always call you. You have to start trusting Keiran. He's passed all your tests by now."

"All except for one," he reminded her. "And I'm still working on how to get that one done."

Mary sighed softly as she finished pinning up her hair, and she turned to face Adam as he leaned against the door jamb of her room. "You're not cute when you're paranoid," she complained, scooting around him to the hallway outside her room and glancing behind her to see him following.

"I'm just trying to keep you safe," he insisted.

"So am I," she exclaimed. "You think I want to get hurt? You think I want what happened back then to happen again?"

"No, but —"

"Listen," she pleaded, turning to face him. "It _has_ been a few months. Don't you think something would've happened by now? We've been careful for almost ten years. I think we can trust someone other than each other just this once."

"You can," he amended. "I don't."

To that, Mary sighed heavily as a knock came at the front door. She moved further down the stairs, arriving at the front door and opening it to see Keiran there in a black suit with a black tie. Her attire was similar as she wore an A-line dress that tied around her neck to support her bust. It was new and a deep green to match her eyes, and it had cost her nearly as much as the laptop sitting on her dresser. But it was a special occasion, and it called for special clothes.

"You look beautiful," Keiran complimented, his eyes connecting with hers after making a trail over her dress and three-inch heels.

Mary blushed, pulling her cream-white shawl over her shoulders. "You don't look half-bad yourself."

Adam cleared his throat from the bottom step of the stairs, and Mary turned to face him.

"Yes?"

"Try not to be out passed midnight this time," he requested.

"Yes, master," she quipped, turning to Keiran and taking his arm to step out of the house.

Keiran was parked behind Adam's '74 Dodge Challenger, and he helped her into the passenger seat of his own '67 Chevrolet Camaro before hurrying around to the driver's seat. Within minutes, they were driving down the dirt road away from the house back into town. Mary glanced at Keiran as he drove, remembering that he'd told her it was Donovan's the first time he'd shown up in it and wondering if his older brother minded them using it all the time. As of yet, Donovan hadn't made another appearance around town. She hoped he wasn't staying away for her benefit.

"We don't have to go to the restaurant," Keiran said as he drove. "It's getting warmer out. We could just go star-gazing."

Mary blushed, hugging her shawl to her shoulders. "We could," she agreed. "We should."

"But?"

She glanced at him again. "I'm hungry," she informed him. "And you said we were going to the best restaurant in Cheyenne. I've been looking forward to it all day."

To that, he laughed softly. "All right," he conceded.

"We can go star-gazing afterward," she added, and he laughed again.

The Albany Restaurant Bar, which struck Mary as odd since they were in Wyoming, was nestled in the middle of Cheyenne, and after parking the car, Keiran pulled her inside to get a table near the windows. He seemed to have some sway over the female maitre d who seated them almost immediately, and the female waitress who took their drink orders didn't seem able to keep her eyes off him. But Keiran only had eyes for Mary, and the woman never held his attention for more than a few seconds.

Halfway through dinner, while she was at their table refilling their drinks, Keiran reached across the table for Mary's hand, caressing her palm gently and grinning over the modest centerpiece.

"Will you be ordering dessert?" the waitress asked, apparently still hoping to garner more of his attention.

He didn't speak for a few seconds, and Mary lifted her eyes to the waitress whose name it appeared was "Julie."

"We're fine right now," she informed the woman. "Maybe just the check."

Julie's smile faded slightly, and once she was gone, Mary laughed softly, turning her attention to Keiran.

"You're horrible," she teased. "I think she wants you."

He smirked, still caressing her palm. "My heart belongs to someone else," he vowed, and Mary blushed for what felt like the millionth time that night.

He paid for their meal and left Julie a tip before they left the restaurant in each other's arms. They got to the car within minutes of leaving the restaurant, and he opened her door for her before sliding in and pulling away from the curb. It was quiet until they were back of the interstate back to Laramie when his cell phone rang from his jacket pocket.

"Hello?" he answered, his smiled fading immediately. "Donovan? I can't hear you right. Donovan, calm down! Donovan!"

Mary was immediately worried, and Keiran shut off his phone while still gripping the steering wheel. "What's wrong?" she asked.

"I'm not sure. He said someone was in the house, and then the line went dead. I have to get back. Now."

She didn't argue, and he sped up, reaching nearly ninety miles per hour as he wove in and out of traffic to get back to Laramie before half an hour passed. He made himself slow down through town, turning down the block he lived on and hurrying inside before Mary was even out of the car. She followed him as quickly as she could in her heels, taking them off as she reached the front porch and then running through the front door as it stood open.

"Keiran!"

She looked through the front rooms, seeing them empty and then moving upstairs to the second floor. She found Keiran at the end of the upstairs hallway hunched over the lifeless body of his older brother. She moved closer, seeing blood covering the upper half of Donovan's body. His eyes were still open.

"They stabbed him," he exclaimed angrily. "They killed him!"

Mary jumped at his outburst, easing closer and kneeling to the floor on Donovan's other side. She laid her hand over his forehead and closed his eyes. Then she lifted her hand to Keiran's face, seeing the kind of fury in his eyes only someone in his position could feel. Then the anger faded, slowly turning into agony as he began to sob.

"What am I supposed to do now?" he demanded softly. "I have no one now."

"That isn't true," Mary promised. "You have me."

He bowed his head then, still sobbing, and Mary found her own cell phone, calling one of only four or five numbers she had in her phone.

"Mary?" Adam answered, a tinge of panic in his voice.

"You need to come to town," she commanded. "Something's happened to Keiran's brother."

"Where are you?"

"203 South Corthell Road," she recited from reading the street signs and the house number. "We're on the second floor."

"I'll be right there," Adam promised.

Mary turned off her phone, moving around to Keiran's side as he sat back away from his brother's body. His hands were covered in blood, and Mary pulled off her shawl to clean it off. He looked at her as she did that, grasping onto her hands as he whispered.

"I don't want pity," he told her as his voice trembled. "I just want you."

Mary squeezed his hands in hers. "And here I am," she promised.

She sat beside him then, allowing him to lean on her while they waited for Adam.

Adam got to the house inside fifteen minutes, coming up the stairs and finding them at the end of the hallway with Donovan's body. He approached them slowly, helping Mary to her feet and then offering his hand to Keiran. Once they were all standing, Adam motioned for them to go downstairs, and Mary didn't hesitate, guiding Keiran away from the hallway to the stairs. She pulled him to the kitchen, pulling off his suit jacket and stationing him in front of the sink so she could wash his hands. Her shawl was ruined, but it didn't matter to her. What mattered was Keiran, and everything else could wait.

Keiran was quiet the whole time, allowing her to roll his sleeves up and then lean him over the sink to hold his hands under the bordering hot water and clean off his brother's blood. She found a wash cloth, unbuttoning the first few buttons of his shirt and soaking his neck and face with warm water. He never said a word, permitting her the chance to soothe him, and once she was sure he was calm, she sat him in a chair at the table and stepped back out into the house as Adam came down the stairs.

"How is he?" Adam asked.

Mary shrugged. "He's in shock, I think. Did you . . . look over his body?" she asked of Donovan.

Adam nodded, patting his own jacket pocket. "Yeah. I called the police too. After that, we should just need to get back to the house." He paused, glancing into the kitchen. "Does he have anywhere to go?"

Mary glanced back herself. "I don't think so. I don't think he should be alone right now. Can we take him to the house with us? Just for the night."

Adam sighed, his unwavering suspicious rearing its ugly head again. "I don't know about that. Surely, he has relatives somewhere else."

"But he doesn't have anyone here," Mary argued. "He needs someone to keep an eye on him, and whether he has other family, we're here now. It's just for tonight. He'll probably have someone to call in the morning. It's almost midnight, Adam."

Adam glanced toward the kitchen again. "Fine," he conceded. "Tonight," he stipulated as the blue/red lights of the local police precinct flashed through the front windows of the house and sirens drifted in through the front door.

Mary half-smiled at her victory, hurrying back to the kitchen where Keiran was still sitting at the table hunched over his legs. She helped him to his feet, pulling him through the dining room to where Adam was standing. "You're coming home with us," she informed him. "Is there anything you need to pack for the night?"

The first set of policemen came through the door then, and a man in a gray suit followed. He zeroed in on the three of them, pulling a badge from his inside coat pocket.

"Detective Shaw Collins," he announced with a pair of suspicious brown eyes and half a day's worth of stubble growing on his jaw. "You Adam Campbell?"

Adam bowed his head. "Detective," he greeted, extending his hand to take the older man's.

"Who found the body?" Collins asked.

Keiran lifted his head. "I did," he designated. "He's my brother."

"And you are?"

"Keiran Masters," he replied softly.

"Can you tell me what happened, Mr. Masters?" Collins asked.

Keiran glanced at Mary, staring half a minute before looking at the detective. "My brother called me while I was on my way home. We were in Cheyenne. When I got here, he was dead upstairs with a knife wound in his gut."

"Was there anyone in the house when you arrived?"

"No," Keiran stated blankly. "But he said someone was in the house before the line went dead."

"Can you think of anyone who would want to do this?" Collins asked bluntly.

"We've only been in town five months," Keiran insisted. "We didn't really know anyone."

"Then who's your girlfriend here?"

Mary extended her hand. "Mary Campbell," she greeted. "I'm Adam's sister. Keiran and I were out tonight when this happened. He's very upset. Is it possible we could leave, and you can call if you have any more questions?"

Though she didn't mean to, Mary used her ability to persuade him to her advantage, and he glanced at Adam before nodding to the door.

"Go on," he allowed.

She smiled graciously, taking Keiran in her arms and guiding him out the door with Adam behind her. They got to the cars before Adam spoke, chastising her softly.

"You know better than to do that," he chided.

"Maybe," she agreed. "But he's in no condition to answer questions like that right now. He'll be fine in the morning. And then we'll come back for anything he needs. We're all he has right now."

Adam wanted to argue, but he could find no fault in Mary's logic, bowing his head and moving back to his car while she sat Keiran in the passenger seat of the Camaro. She hurried around to the driver's seat, slipping in and turning the engine over so she could follow Adam out to the house north of town. It was a little cooler out here now that her shawl was gone, and she realized that she'd left it in the kitchen less than halfway to her house.

Mary was happy to see the yellow-gold archs of the porch light as it illuminated the small front yard of her house, and she pulled up behind Adam before moving around to the passenger door to help Keiran. He'd been silent the whole way, and despite only ten minutes passing since then, it still worried her. When her parents had been killed, she'd been silent for two days — almost three. She'd gone into shock almost immediately, unable to speak or move or cry. Keiran looked like he was about to fall apart, and Mary knew what that felt like.

She walked Keiran inside to the living room while Adam went upstairs, and she sat Keiran on the couch so she could get him something to drink from the kitchen. She found a couple of sodas in the fridge, carrying them back to the living room and then sitting in front of Keiran on the coffee table there as she handed one to him.

"Are you okay?" she whispered softly.

"My head hurts," he replied blankly.

Mary extended her hand, touching his forehead with her fingertips and easing a few strands of his hair out of his eyes. He looked at her, taking her hand in his and then leaning closer until his face was a centimeter or two from hers. The tip of his nose touched hers, his warm breath mingling with hers as he lifted his head and captured her lips in his. But before it could go much further, he whispered, pressing the bridge of his nose against hers.

"I feel so lost," he cried softly.

She leaned back to look at him, touching his cheek and lifting her lips to his forehead. She pressed her cheek to his skin. "I know exactly how you feel," she soothed.

He slid his arms around her waist, pulling her off the coffee table until she was sitting over his legs while still wearing her dress. Mary sat back to cradle his face in her hands, feeling for the first time since meeting him that they were more alike than she'd originally believed. She knew no one in the world was much more like her than one particular set of individuals — the Lilin. But Keiran was a boy. And he had little, if no sway over her despite how easily they'd become friends and then more. And he was nothing like how Eleanor had been the first time Mary had met her.

Keiran leaned up to kiss her again, interrupting her thoughts and pulling her closer to him so their bodies were completely aligned. His hands worked fast, unfastening the ties of Mary's dress and moving the fabric away from her back and then her shoulders. She could only think of him and his kiss and his touch. Nothing else registered, until he leaned her back to uncover her chest. Mary had never been so close to a boy like this. She'd never felt what she was feeling at this very moment, and it looked like Keiran had never felt this way either. He held her eyes while grasping her thighs, his resolve to finish what he'd started fading slowly.

"I love you," he whispered instead, the sound falling on Mary's ears like a soft caress. "I shouldn't. But I do."

Mary blushed gently, leaning closer and laying her forehead over his. "I love you, Keiran," she swore. "And I don't care if I shouldn't. I know I always will."

He slowly unbuttoned his shirt, pulling it off and then draping it over her shoulders before he helped her to her feet and then rose in front of her. Without her heels on, Mary realized again how much taller than her he was, and he leaned in to kiss her, taking her hands in his and then urging her to guide him away from the living room.

She turned off the lights then, pulling Keiran up to the second floor and her room which was situated a few rooms away from Adam's room. Mary sat Keiran on the bed, kneeling to the floor to pull off his shoes and then his socks.

"I'm not, um . . ." He paused, and Mary stood up in front of him. "I'm not wearing any . . ."

Mary grinned laying her hands over his shoulders. "Relax, silly," she teased. "It's after midnight. I don't know about you, but I'm beat. I'm just going to clean off my make-up, and I'll be right back. I promise."

She caressed his cheek then, stepping around the bed and then into her bathroom to close the door. She pulled off her dress, hanging it on a hook on the back of the door, and then she turned to her mirror. It only took her a couple of minutes to wash off her make-up, and she pulled her hair all the way down, gazing at her face in the mirror and wondering if she looked like a girl who was about to sleep in the same bed with her boyfriend for the first time.

"Maybe," she whispered.

With that, she left the bathroom, discovering Keiran asleep over the comforter in his dress pants. She smiled when she saw him, finding a blanket in her closet and then laying on the bed in front of him to drape the blanket over them both. She relaxed as soon as she was laid down, inhaling Keiran's scent now that he was so close and memorizing it as completely as anything else in her life.

**_To be continued . . ._**

* * *

**Well, if you've gotten all the way down there, then you haven't gotten totally lost by the timeline, and I can't promise it won't get a little worse before it gets better. We're still going to be in the future, or whatever, in the next chapter, which will be a continuation of this chapter until we meet when Dean and Sam were on their way to Bobby's.  
**

**And if you remember the story from 'Resurrection,' then you'll recognize a few things sprinkled throughout this chapter and a lot of the chapters to follow. Just little things I put in there to see if you're paying attention.**

**So I'll leave you to it, and if you can, don't forget to tell me what you think. And as mentioned previously, I'll be re-editing 'Resurrection' to take out all the typos and such, but it'll be a slow-going process. Bear with me.**

**Other than that, I hope you've enjoyed, and I'll see you on the next run!**


	4. Seduction 2

**Part Two of Chapter Three, or around there. **

**If you're here, then you've read the other chapters, and you should know what's going on. This one picks up right after the last one, and will get us to about four months before the beginning of chapter one. **

**Not a lot else to say except, See you at the bottom!**

**Now go on, Read!  
**

* * *

**Two**

**Seduction**

**(Contd.)**

Dawn illuminated a fresh new problem for Adam when he got up and went downstairs, discovering the two unopened bottles on the coffee table. Even though he trusted Mary and knew she would never do anything to put herself in danger, he didn't trust Keiran. He didn't trust this kid at all, and having him under their roof was putting Adam on edge in way he hadn't been in almost ten years — not since the first time he and Mary had met. It didn't matter that Mary seemed to know something about Keiran she wasn't telling him. And it didn't matter if she really liked Keiran. Adam didn't trust him.

And it was for that reason that Adam found himself outside Mary's bedroom door, after having sworn to himself he would never enter her room uninvited after she hit fifteen. He listened through the door, hoping nothing he didn't want to see might be happening on the other side, and he momentarily thought about the vile of blood he'd taken from Donovan's body, wondering if Donovan had even been dead despite his appearance. A creak along the floor inside Mary's room reached Adam's ears through the door, and he turned the knob without waiting, stepping into the room to discover Mary and Keiran on the bed asleep beneath a throw blanket. She was still dressed, and so was Keiran.

Adam breathed a sigh of relief, hearing a knock on the door and leaving Mary's room to find out who was at the house so early. He saw the outline of a tall, broad-chested person through the window sheers, stepping up to the door and opening it to find a uniformed police officer there with a peculiar expression on his face.

"Good morning, officer," Adam said, reaching to shake the man's hand. "How can I help you?"

"Officer Peter Mosely," he greeted, with a hint of regret in his voice, "I need to talk to Keiran Masters. It's about his brother, Donovan."

Curiously, Adam opened the door wider, and the officer stepped into the house with his hands planted on his hips.

"Have a seat in the living room," Adam offered, moving through the back hall to the kitchen. "I think he's upstairs. I was just gonna put on some coffee."

It took a minute for him to obey, and once he sat in the living room, Adam stepped into the kitchen to put on a pot of coffee. Once that was started, he tip-toed up the back stairs to the second floor without alerting the officer to his exit.

They'd picked this house for a lot of reasons. For one, it was four and a half miles outside town. There were two sets of stairs, a wrap-around porch, and a wrap-around balcony. The basement was the size of the ground floor and the attic was the size of the second floor, giving them space to interrogate demons if one ever found them. The realtor had been a little surprised at their choice, especially since the house hadn't been inhabited for over ten years, but to Adam and Mary, that meant no one was going to come back while they were staying there. It also made for a decent getaway, if necessary.

Adam stepped back into Mary's room, moving to the side of the bed Keiran was lying on and waking him up with a shake to his shoulder.

"Hey," he whispered. "Wake up. There's a cop here to see you. It's about your brother."

It seemed to take Keiran a few seconds to remember where he was, and Adam stood up from the bed as Mary also opened her eyes to see Adam there.

"What's going on?" she asked, yawning.

"There's a cop here to see Keiran," Adam explained. "It's about his brother."

With that, Adam left the room and made his way back to the kitchen through the back stairs, and he poured two cups of coffee before returning to the living room where Officer Mosely was still sitting.

"So what's this about Keiran's brother?" Adam asked the man.

"Is he here?"

Adam bowed his head over his coffee. "Yes. And if you're going to give him the third degree, I'd like to know about it now before he comes down."

Officer Mosely sighed over his own coffee. "Last night, after they carried Donovan Masters' body to the medical examiner's office, it disappeared from the morgue — before they could find a cause of death. They searched the house the boys' lived in, but other than a few missing items, they couldn't find any sign of a struggle. And we need Keiran to come to the medical examiner's office to give a blood sample for DNA matching."

"Why?" Adam asked, hearing the stairs creak with Mary and Keiran's descent.

"There were four unidentified sets of prints throughout Keiran and Donovan's house. It's possible one of those could belong to the person who killed Donovan. But we can't find any real information about Keiran on the system. No fingerprints, no birth certificate, no social security number. Either Keiran Masters doesn't exist, or . . ."

"Or what?" Adam asked.

Mary and Keiran came down then. She was wearing jogging pants and a t-shirt, and Keiran was wearing his dress pants and shirt from the night before. Adam stood up, and Officer Mosely followed, eyeing Keiran suspiciously and then sitting down when they sat down with Adam on the couch.

"What's this about?" Keiran asked, glancing at Mary and Adam and then looking at Officer Mosely.

It was quiet and awkward for a minute, and Adam spoke when the officer didn't.

"Something's happened since we came back from your house," he began. "Officer Mosley came here to ask you a few questions about your brother. It seems they lost his body from the morgue before the medical examiner could find a cause of death."

Keiran squinted his eyes confusingly. "He was stabbed," he stated plainly. "I saw the wound."

"No, son, you saw blood," Officer Mosely corrected. "The preliminary didn't show any injuries to the outside of his body. We were hoping you could come down to the medical examiner's to give a blood sample for DNA testing."

"Why?" he asked, the same way Adam had asked.

Officer Mosely leaned forward. "Son, can you tell me where you born?"

Keiran looked at Mary and Adam. "Hillsborough, New Hampshire," he revealed, looking at the officer. "But I was adopted as a baby. And my adoptive parents died when I was nine. Donovan and I have been on our own since."

"Do you have any way of proving any of that?" Officer Mosely asked more directly than he had a moment earlier.

Mary spoke before Keiran could. "Excuse me," she exclaimed. "I think you should show him a little more compassion than that, Officer. He just lost his brother. It doesn't matter how or why. And whether he has proof of his past or not, it's your job to help people, not accuse them of lying."

Adam intervened before Mary had a chance to persuade the officer off his line of questioning. "It shouldn't be too much trouble coming into the examiner's office," he assured Officer Mosely. "But it's barely seven in the morning. Can we have a few hours? Say until noon."

Officer Mosely still eyed Keiran suspiciously, looking at Adam and Mary a little more trustingly. "Noon, it is," he agreed. "You know where the police station is?"

Adam nodded, rising and prompting the man to follow him. "I do."

Mosely bowed his head, and Adam showed him out before returning to the living room where Mary was still sitting with Keiran.

"I've told you not to do that," he chastised.

"Do what?" Keiran asked.

Adam sighed heavily. "Pack," he told Mary. "We're leaving. And you," he pointed at Keiran, "have a lot of explaining to do. Go. Now."

Mary didn't argue, pulling Keiran with her upstairs to her room to pack.

* * *

Mary packed faster than she had in over four years. Though she'd acquired a lot more in the last few years than she thought possible, it took her less than an hour and a half to pack all of it into her bags and get her bags into the trunk of Adam's car. Anything she didn't need, Mary threw it away, burning most of the articles she'd collected since moving to Laramie and locking her memory box while Adam boxed up the food still stored inside the kitchen. Keiran tried to help, but Adam refused any he tried to give. After a few months, it looked like they were back where they'd started.

After packing up their belongings, Mary insisted on going back to Keiran's house to pack his own things. She wasn't leaving him alone in a town where he didn't know anyone, and it didn't bother her at all that he'd only really gotten to know her.

"Doesn't that seem a little strange to you?" Adam asked as they packed the trunk. "No one else but you can vouch for him. I think that's a little strange."

"Maybe I'm the only one who's been nice to him," Mary accused, glaring at Adam a lot like she had the first time he'd met Keiran. "And no, that doesn't seem odd to me. To me, it means he's uncomfortable with people he doesn't know, and that makes it hard for him to be around people. I took that first step; maybe no one else did. Please just trust me."

This time, for the first time since it had been just the two of them, Adam didn't reply. He didn't say, 'I do.' He just huffed and closed the trunk.

Keiran came out of the house then, and Mary hurried up the driveway to help him carry the last of her things. She set the bags in the back of his car, moving around to the passenger seat to get in as she called to Adam.

"Follow us to Keiran's house, okay?" she requested.

Adam had no choice, sliding into his car and turning the engine over as Keiran pulled out of the driveway and then started down the road to get back into town. Mary kept an eye on Adam's car the whole time, observing Keiran silently as he drove and seeing the red in his cheeks and the bags under his eyes. She reached for his hand, and he glanced at her, grinning sadly and lifting her fingers to his lips a few seconds before he turned his eyes back to the road.

Police tape marked off Keiran's front porch, and Mary walked inside with him to see the front rooms barely filled with furniture. There was a table but no chairs in the dining room, and even though Mary remembered a couch and table in the living room, there was little else to make the house feel lived in. She followed Keiran upstairs, seeing the bare wood floors and a large blood stain on the floor at the end of the hallway. She'd only been here once, but now that it was light out, she wanted to see where Keiran lived.

He pulled her to his room, and the first thing she noticed was how much more homey his room felt to the rest of the house. She waited for him at the door while he packed the few clothes and personal belongings strewn around the room. She saw books and old 45s next to a record player, and when Keiran began to change, Mary automatically turned her back to him, listening to him shift out of his dress shirt and pants. He'd said the night before that he wasn't wearing any underwear, and Mary had never seen a naked man before. Her cheeks flooded with heat instantly, and she folded her arms over her chest just as he laughed softly.

"It's all right," he chuckled. "I'm clothed."

Mary peeked over her shoulder, seeing him shirtless on the bed while he pulled on a pair of sneakers. "It's okay," she nodded. Then she bowed her head to give him a little more privacy.

A minute or two passed, and Mary became aware of him standing behind her a few seconds before she felt his hands over her arms. The heat from his body radiated to hers, and he leaned over her neck, gently kissing the spot behind her ear.

"I'm glad you're here," he whispered.

Mary lifted her hand to his, looking over her shoulder at him. She lifted her hand to his face, turning to face him. "You're never going to be alone again," she promised him. "I'm here. And I'm not going anywhere. You can trust me on that. Okay?"

He leaned closer to her, laying his forehead over hers and holding her closer to him. Mary realized then that he still wasn't wearing a shirt. She remembered waking up with him that morning, and she hoped they had more moments like that — without Adam bursting in and announcing a police officer was in the house.

"We should go," she whispered.

He stepped back then, lifting a shirt in his hands and pulling it on before he picked up the large duffle bag now laying on his bed. Mary led the way, still looking around and knowing she was never going to forget what she was seeing. She knew she was never going to look at Keiran the same despite only knowing him literally the whole time he'd been in town. She knew she was never going to be the same.

Adam honked the horn just as they stepped outside, and he stood up facing Keiran and speaking more resolutely than he had the last time they'd left a semi-permanent place.

"We'll have to get rid of your car up the road," he announced, leaving no room for discussion. "It's an hour and a half to the nearest reservoir. It's a good thing that's supposed to be your brother's car."

Keiran didn't argue, nudging Mary toward Adam's car, and she kept her eyes on his even as she settled into the passenger seat next to Adam.

From Keiran's house, they drove north out of town on US-287, and Mary did everything she could to keep her mind off the fact that they were leaving another home. She'd done it enough now that it shouldn't have made a difference anymore. None of the places they'd stayed had made much of an impression. The only reminder Mary had of any of them were a few mementos she'd forced herself to purchase along the way. A t-shirt here, a bumper-sticker there. Of course, none of those things which were meant for the car were ever placed on it. Adam wasn't very persistent in her making memories, but Mary knew there would come a time when she was safe and would have the chance to settle down. She was looking forward to it.

After an hour and a half, they made it to the reservoir, and Mary helped Keiran pack his bags into the trunk of Adam's car while her older "brother" got Keiran's car ready to be submerged. Mary and Adam had been forced to do this when she'd been fifteen, walking for over a hundred miles to the nearest rest stop with only a bag each. Not every place they'd gone to had been with a roof. Sometimes, they'd camped or slept under the stars. But they'd never hitch-hiked. The one time a trucker had pulled over for them, Adam had turned him away — two hundred dollars richer.

"You ready?" Adam prompted.

Keiran glanced at Mary, and together, they joined Adam where he'd pushed Keiran's car. The edge of the reservoir was steepest here, which would make it easier for the car to slip under the surface of the water unhindered. Adam put the car in neutral, and while Mary stood out of the way, he and Keiran pushed the car over the edge into the water. Spray was caught in the light breeze, and warm mid-Spring water splashed out into the body of the reservoir as the heavy metal car began to sink. They waited until the roof of the car was gone, and once the surface of the water began to settle, they all returned to Adam's car.

"We need to talk," Adam told Keiran, gesturing for him to sit up front, and Mary reluctantly slid into the back seat so they could get back on the road away from Laramie.

* * *

In the twenty-odd minutes it took Adam to get back to Hwy 34 W, he was able to ask Keiran more than ten different questions about his family and how he and his brother Donovan had ended up in Laramie six months after he and Mary had pulled into town. Mary tried not to listen to the way Adam changed his tone after every question — sounding more suspicious each time he raised his voice. For whatever reason, Mary didn't care how Keiran had ended up in Laramie. Over the last five months, she'd come to know him in the simplest way, and it didn't matter to her that he couldn't answer all of Adam's questions.

When they pulled onto the highway to go left toward the next town, Adam's phone rang from his pocket, and he answered it while driving.

"Officer Mosely," he said, glancing back at Mary in the rearview mirror. "I was just going to call you. Something's come up, and I won't be able to bring Keiran by the station. Yes, sir, I understand. Tomorrow." A long pause followed, and Adam glanced at Keiran before lifting his eyes to the rearview mirror again. "Really? No, I didn't know that, but I'll ask him about it. Yes, Officer Mosely. Thank you. Bye."

Adam turned off his phone, speaking without missing a beat. "Would you mind explaining how the police didn't find any photography equipment in your house when they searched it last night?"

Keiran hesitated, glancing at Mary.

"Don't look at her," Adam ordered. "You said your brother was a freelance photographer. Where is his photography equipment?"

"He . . . has a safe in the basement," Keiran explained, his voice soft. "It took him years to collect all of it, and he's — he was possessive of it all. And he only took out what he needed for the assignment he was on. He's my — he was my brother. I wasn't his keeper. I don't know why they didn't find his equipment. Maybe they thought it would be in his room."

When Keiran paused, Adam took the opportunity to speak again. "Actually, they looked everywhere in the house. The only room that looked like anyone had lived in it was yours. Is there something you're not telling me? Because you're in my car now, and I have no reservation whatsoever with pulling over and putting you out right now. I will not risk Mary's life over you."

"Adam!" Mary exclaimed. "That's not fair."

"Did you know about this?" Adam accused. "Do you care nothing about your own safety? Have I isolated you so much that you're willing to risk your life for someone you don't know?"

"Stop," Keiran pleaded. Adam and Mary looked at him as he sat in the front seat with his head bowed. "Donovan . . . was gone all the time. He was on assignment all over the state. I'm only 19, and he didn't want to drag me along with him. So he rented the house, and he would send me money for the bills. I stayed in my room. It wasn't my house, so I didn't see a reason to live in it. He did what he could to support me, and in return, I stayed where he told me to stay. I didn't mean to keep it a secret. I just didn't think — "

"Didn't think what?" Adam interrupted. "Your brother left you to fend for yourself in a town where you knew no one, and you didn't think I would understand? Is that it?"

"I'm sorry," Keiran whispered. "He's my brother. He's all I had left. When I met Mary, everything changed. And I know how much she means to you. I would never put her life in danger. I swear. But I can take care of myself. Donovan and I thought if anyone knew I was there by myself, they would call the police or Child Protective Services. We weren't always safe because I was always too young."

"And that's not something we're unfamiliar with," Mary interjected, to which Adam glanced at her. "And you're not alone anymore," she told Keiran, and he looked at her. "You have us now."

He bowed his head again, reaching for her hand and leaning closer to kiss her temple.

Adam sighed heavily. "All right, all right," he complained. "That's good. Mary, sit back in the seat please."

She smiled slightly, sitting back and reaching into her bag to pull out a book for the rest of the ride to the nearest town.

* * *

Mary knew they were getting close to a town when all the houses started cropping up along the interstate, and when Adam pulled off the road to get gas, she decided it was time for them to eat. She knew they weren't stopping, since it was only around one-thirty, and it would probably be close to dark before they got where they were going to be for the night. If she was hungry, she was sure Keiran was hungry because neither of them had eaten breakfast.

"We're going in to eat," she said to Adam, pulling Keiran behind her toward the restaurant attached to the gas station.

Adam nodded, silently telling her he would join them as soon as he was finished getting gas.

After gas and food, they got back on the interstate, and with a map in hand, Adam decided to drive to Rapid City where they could reevaluate everything that had happened so far and maybe even call Bobby to find out what to do next. Mary remained in the back seat, finding a pillow and a blanket to sleep for the rest of the drive, and she made sure Adam knew that she was tired and didn't want him disrupting her sleep to ask Keiran more questions about his family. It had already been a long day, and they were now on the run from the police with a new passenger in tow. It all reminded her absurdly of when she'd been fifteen, and she knew he didn't want a repeat performance like last time.

A hand on Mary's leg woke her from her nap, and she opened her eyes to see Keiran still in the front seat of the car. The sun was still shining, but sunset was on a couple of hours away, and she sat up to see Adam gone.

"He went inside to get a room," Keiran said softly. "Did you sleep okay?"

Her disorientation faded slowly, and she moved closer to him. "It was fine," she assured him. She reached for his face, lifting her other hand to his shoulder and grasping onto his shirt. "Are you okay? Adam didn't interrogate you while I was asleep, did he?"

Keiran grinned. "No. He was on the phone."

Mary nodded, looking around to see they were parked in front of a motel. She realized she was thirsty, and Keiran flew into action almost immediately, stepping out of the car and helping her out before he guided her to a coke machine nearby. She never said anything to him. It was almost like he could read her mind — like Eleanor. At that thought, Mary reached for him again, turning him to face her. He looked a little more relaxed than when she'd gone to sleep, but he was still tense, and he lifted his hands to her arms as she lifted her eyes to his.

"Keiran," she said softly. "I need to ask you something. And I need you to be honest with me."

He bowed his head. "Okay."

She looked around, making sure Adam was still inside before she turned all her attention to Keiran. "Did you move to Laramie because I lived there?" she asked pointedly.

He hesitated, like he had when Adam had asked about Donovan's photography equipment. She lifted her hands to his face, making him look at her. His eyes flashed bright green, the way they had the day he'd met Adam, and Mary felt the vision come again like it had when she'd been eight.

"No," he said after several seconds, continuing, "I wasn't sure you were there until I saw you. I felt you there, and I smelled you. And then Donovan came."

Mary felt her heart in her throat as she still held Keiran's face in her hands, and he stepped closer to her, lowering his hands to her waist.

"He warned me," Keiran whispered. "About you. About Eleanor. And when I met you, I understood what had happened to her. Because it happened to me too. I love you, Mary. I shouldn't," he warned, the way he always had. Mary didn't know why he said that until now. "But I do," he nodded.

"Is Donovan really your brother?" she asked so softly she wasn't sure he heard her.

"No," he shook his head. "At least, not in the biological sense. Please, I'll tell you everything, but not here. Not out in the open. They'll hear us."

Mary looked around again, making sure they were still alone, and she stepped away from him, looking at him for the first time as what he really was. Mary felt like she'd known all along. She knew the way he'd acted around her wasn't right, and the way he made her feel wasn't right. And she hadn't cared at all. The way he spoke of his family and Donovan and even her — it all reminded her of Eleanor and the others. She'd only been with them a short while — a few hours at best — but they'd told her so much even if she hadn't allowed it to corrupt her the way they'd hoped. It was then that she realized why she'd been so drawn to Keiran. He was exactly like her. Lilin.

Adam came out of the office to the motel then, and Mary glanced at him, realizing how much trouble they were really in. He noticed her expression, hurrying to her side.

"Hey, are you okay?" he pleaded. "I didn't mean for you to wake up with me gone. Mary, what's wrong?"

She looked at Keiran again, seeing his own eyes pleading with her, and she made the only choice she could. "I'm fine," she assured Adam. "Nothing's wrong. I'm just — I just woke up. I'm a little disoriented."

"Well, we'll go find somewhere to eat in a little while," Adam promised her. "Right now, let's get you inside. I called Bobby. He's checking around the area before getting on his way here."

Though they'd been living in a house for the last eleven months, Mary and Adam adjusted to motel life easily, having spent many sleepless nights hiding from the police and playing board games to keep their minds off the fact that they were all alone and had no clue what they were doing. Keiran didn't seem to have too much trouble settling in, and Mary wondered if he'd spent a lot of time traveling with Donovan despite the fact that they weren't really brothers. She wanted to know so much about him that had nothing to do with what he was doing in Laramie. And she didn't want Adam to know just yet, since she knew he would call Dean and Sam, and then she would never get any answers.

"There's a diner up the street," Adam said nonchalantly, like there wasn't a giant elephant in the room none of them wanted to talk about. "We should eat."

Mary glanced at Keiran, thinking she could talk to him if Adam left to get them food. "Yeah," she said. "I am kind of hungry. Keiran and I will stay here."

Adam looked at her strangely, and Mary sighed annoyingly.

"It's fine. Just go. We'll be here. What do you think? We're just going to skip out on you or something?"

Adam eyed Keiran suspiciously, rising and pulling out his wallet. "All right," he said after a minute. "Lock the door behind me. I'll knock twice, pause and then knock one more time."

Mary stood up to meet him in the middle of the room as Keiran sat on one of the two beds. "Okay. Be careful," she requested.

He leaned close, kissing her forehead and then moving back to the door to leave quietly. Mary locked the door then, looking out the window and making sure Adam was gone before she turned to face Keiran. He sat up straight then, and Mary moved to the other bed to make him face her.

"So," she began, "tell me. How long have you been looking for me?"

His eyes scanned the room like he was still making sure they were alone. Then he looked at her. "Since you were fifteen," he admitted. "It was then that those like Eleanor became useless in swaying you."

"Swaying me?" she repeated. "Like Eleanor. You mean women?"

He bowed his head. "Yes," he acknowledged. "But it wasn't me then. It was Donovan."

Mary became confused, remembering how she and Adam had been forced to run when she'd been fifteen, and she didn't remember seeing Donovan in the town they'd been staying in at the time. And she usually remembered details like that. Despite a few years having passed since then, Mary knew she hadn't seen Donovan that night.

"I don't remember seeing him," she recalled. "And we were in town for almost six months before we had to leave. If he was looking for me, then why — "

"We weren't — I mean, he wasn't supposed to make contact with you. But we were still exchanging power with our female counterparts, and they were still very possessive of their place where you were concerned." He paused, covering his face and then rubbing his forehead. Then he lifted his eyes to Mary's. "One of them tried to take you, and we knew they wouldn't be able to sway you. I was too young to help, so Donovan and another brother Adrian had to fight the women for the right to do our duty. By the time we'd defeated them, you were gone, and we had to start over again. That's when Donovan decided to make it my responsibility to detect you, since I was closer to your age."

"How do you know him?" she asked softly, surprised she wasn't scared of what she was hearing. "And how did you get so close?"

"I was born in New Hampshire," he began, a lot like when he'd been talking to Officer Mosely. "I was adopted as a baby. They told me my mother was only sixteen when she had me, and she couldn't keep me. I don't know what happened to her after I was adopted. But my father and mother — they loved me, and they taught me to love, instead of what the others learned." He paused again, inhaling deeply and gently wiping the top of his cheek. Mary realized he was crying again, and she lifted her hands to his face to make him look at her. Then he continued. "I was at a friend's house when the police came to tell me they'd been in a car accident. I was nine. And a few days later, Donovan showed up, claiming to be my father's younger brother. He looked like me, and the people keeping me didn't see any problems with his paperwork. So they let me go with him."

"But you'd never seen him before," Mary concluded.

Keiran shook his head.

"Were you afraid of him? Did he scare you?"

"Only at first," Keiran shrugged. "He talked about me like he already knew me. And I didn't know anything about him. He was almost ten years older than me, and he spoke of things I'd never heard of before. And he said it wouldn't be long before I was ready to fulfill my purpose. He never told me what it was, but he always said I was getting closer. After a few years of running, I became accustomed to our life. He taught me things I never would've learned with my parents, and he never lied to me about why I was with him. It was just us until I was fourteen."

Listening to Keiran talk about Donovan made Mary think they'd only been able to depend on each other, but all she could really think about was something Adam had told her when they'd been left on their own.

"But how did you get so close?" she asked again. "No one was supposed to be able to find us — I mean, other than Bobby and Cas."

Despite everything he'd just said, Keiran was obviously as oblivious about the whole thing as Mary, shrugging slightly. "I was just able to," he insisted. "And afterward, I — I didn't want to leave you. I was alone. Donovan and the others had their tasks to complete. I stopped fighting the way I was feeling, and I don't care if I'm not supposed to love you. I just do."

Two knocks on the door startled Mary, and she stood up from the bed in front of Keiran, hearing a pause and then another knock before she hurried to the door to let Adam inside. He was weighed down with three white paper bags and three soft drinks, and Mary immediately helped him carry everything to the table near the window.

"I got three specials," Adam announced. "Bobby should be here in the morning. He'll help us with money and a new place to stay for a little while. He asked if he should call . . . everyone else, but I said not to. We've had to run from the police before. We know the drill. Let's just eat."

With that, they all sat down to eat.

An hour passed silently, and Mary purposefully kept her eyes on her plate to keep from looking at Adam. She didn't like lying to him, and she knew he only wanted to keep her safe. But Mary knew what would happen if he knew what was going on, and she could understand. She couldn't say anything to anyone until she knew for sure they were in danger.

She finished eating first, going to the bathroom and locking herself in before she sat over the toilet seat to evaluate what she was going to do until she felt right telling Adam what she knew in a way where he wouldn't overreact. When she'd been eight, she'd had to make a split decision that would be safe for everyone, and it had turned out to be a dangerous choice. Going with Eleanor that day had caused a lot of things to happen that didn't need to, and she'd trusted Eleanor for the wrong reasons. Mary knew she could trust Keiran. She wasn't sure how, but she just knew. He behaved differently from Eleanor, and he made different choices than she figured any other Lilin would. He wasn't worried about himself. He was only worried about Mary.

"Mary," Adam called through the door. "Are you okay?"

She stood up from the toilet seat slowly, stepping in front of the mirror and making sure she didn't look the way she felt.

Adam spoke a little more sympathetically. "Hey, it's late. We should get some sleep."

She inhaled deeply. "Okay," she called.

She waited a few minutes, unlocking the door and then stepping out into the room where two beds set uninvitingly. Mary wasn't tired since she'd slept on the way there, and if she laid down now, she knew she would be sharing a bed with Adam since he was already weary of leaving her alone with Keiran.

Adam looked at her as she came out of the bathroom, and she moved to her bags to get a jacket.

"I'm not tired," she informed him. "You've been driving all day, so you need to sleep. I'm going for a walk."

He opened his mouth to argue, and she stopped him.

"I have the taser," she promised, "and I won't go far. I'll just be in the parking lot."

Adam sighed heavily, bowing his head and then nodding.

Mary glanced at Keiran, pulling her jacket on and then stepping outside the motel room where Adam's car was parked in front of her. She moved to the trunk end of the car, settling against the bumper and then looking up at the sky. It was clear out, and the stars were coming out in the eastern horizon. She'd done this a lot over the last eleven years of her life, especially with Adam when they'd had to camp out. But for everything that had just happened, all Mary could think about was her first night with Dean, Sam and Adam after they'd adopted her.

They'd had to spend the night with Sarah until leaving New York had been safe, and even though it had been February in Upstate New York, Sam had been able to find an electric blanket before sitting in the back yard of Sarah's house with Mary to watch the stars during a rare meteor shower. Mary had fallen asleep in Sam's arms for the first time in a long line of star-gazing expeditions they'd done during their year on the road. Now more than ever, Mary wished she knew what Sam and Dean were doing. It was late May. She hoped they were riding around with the windows down. She hoped they were somewhere warm. She hoped they were safe.

"Are you afraid of me now?" she heard and turned to see Keiran there alone.

He stepped into her side, and Mary folded her arms over her chest. "I'm not afraid of anything," she proclaimed. "I knew this would happen one day. I just wasn't expecting it to happen like this."

"Like me?" he asked, furrowing his eyebrows.

She nodded, bowing her head.

He touched her face then, and she looked at him. "I'm not going to hurt you," he promised. "I never _wanted_ to hurt you. I don't know why. By all rights, it should've been the only concern I had. But I saw you with Adam. And I saw you with other people in town. No matter what Donovan wanted, I always wanted to keep you safe. And when the time comes, I won't let anyone hurt you. I swear that to you."

Mary felt the inside of her chest swell, and the butterflies in her stomach fluttered furiously as he leaned closer and kissed her for the first time since being in her house the night before. So much had happened since then, and Mary knew so much more would happen before everything was settled. But with Keiran close, it felt like none of those things mattered so much anymore. No one would be happy about what she was thinking of doing, but if what she was thinking about the last time was right, there was only one way to make sure she was safe.

She lifted her hands to Keiran's collar, pulling him closer and turning him to face her until he was in front of her as they both leaned back against the trunk of the car. He tried to lean away, but Mary kept him close, whispering against his lips.

"It's okay."

He grasped onto her waist, pressing his forehead against hers. "No," he whispered. "It's not . . . okay. Not the way you're thinking. Mary, I can . . . hear what you're thinking. I've been able to for the last week or so. Being so close to you is causing more of my instincts to become active. Eleanor could do it. I don't know if she still can. It's not your responsibility to keep everyone safe. The people around you should be doing that. It's their job. Not yours."

Mary didn't hesitate, still kissing him and whispering. "Then keep me safe, Keiran," she pleaded. "You're the only one who can."

He leaned back slowly, lowering his eyes to hers.

"I shouldn't trust you," she assured him. "But I do. Because you're different. I know it. I can see when I look at you. And I can feel it when I touch you. Whether that was my doing or yours, it's been done. And it can't be undone. No one can undo this now, and I wouldn't want them to even if they could. Please, Keiran. I love you."

The resolve in his eyes to deny her faded slowly, and Mary took his hands in hers, pulling him to the car and then sliding into the empty back seat.

"Here?" he whispered.

"Unless you'd rather be inside," she suggested.

He didn't say anything else, leaning closer and kissing her the way he had outside, and Mary kissed him back, allowing him to sit her on top of his lap so they were facing each other. It was getting dark, and that could work to their advantage. Hopefully, Adam wouldn't come looking for them any time soon.

* * *

When Bobby got to the motel in the morning, he came with enough money and supplies to keep Mary and Adam on the road until they could find another small town away from Laramie, Wyoming. Bobby was more weary of Keiran than Adam had been, and he asked him about a million more questions than Adam had. Mary knew better than to argue with Bobby's intentions, and she never tried to interrupt the man who was closer to a father figure to her than anything she'd had in ten years. And to her extreme relief, Keiran answered all of Bobby's questions about his family and Donovan. There were only a few things Bobby never asked Keiran, but Mary knew the answers despite the questions never being said aloud.

They were only in Rapid City a couple of days, while Adam was calling around to a few out-of-state papers to get a price on houses. Bobby laid down false trails for the state police who would more than likely ask for assistance from their neighbors to look for Adam, Mary and Keiran, and he had new i.d.'s and government documents for them despite only having a small amount of Keiran's information. He left credit card records at a different motel across town along with making purchases in a department store despite knowing the police would look at video footage.

When Adam, Mary and Keiran got back on the road, Bobby made sure they knew not to contact him for at least a month to ensure everything was safe again. Mary never told Bobby about the steps she'd taken to foil whatever plans anyone had for her, and she didn't tell Adam it was possible they were being followed. She just hoped they could get as far away from this place as possible by nightfall.

They stopped in Bismark to eat lunch, getting a map of Minnesota and filling Adam's car with gas before they got on the road again. Mary did everything she could to occupy herself with the book she'd left out of her bag for the trip, and every time she looked at Keiran, she tried not to think about what they'd done. It wasn't that she regretted it. In fact, she felt like she'd never made a better decision in her life. But every time she looked at Keiran, she remembered that he could now hear what she was thinking, and she knew if Adam saw the look on her face and Keiran's face, it wouldn't take him long to figure out what was going on. And more than anything, Mary wanted to keep this secret as long as she could. For her and for Keiran. She knew he deserved protection as much as she did now. And she was more than willing to see that he received it.

Adam stopped in Fargo for a bathroom break, and he put a little more gas in the car since he'd looked at the map and seen a good place for them to settle. By then, it was nearly four-thirty in the afternoon. Mary was getting sick of the car, and she was sure her co-car-companions were also. Adam had decided to settle outside Grand Rapids after calling ahead to see about houses for sale, and since Bobby had given him enough money for a few months of rent, Adam had persuaded the person selling the house to take a few months worth of rent money in exchange for changing the bills over into a new name. It couldn't be Adam's or Mary's, and Keiran had actually suggested his mother's maiden name. Adam hmm'd and hah'd the whole time, but even he agreed it was a good idea, especially since the police in South Dakota hadn't been able to extract that particular piece of information from Keiran.

The sun was nearly an hour from setting when they pulled into Grand Rapids, Minnesota, and by that time, Mary was absolutely positive she wanted to get out of the car. Adam and Keiran were both in vehement agreement, and Adam pulled through town to a restaurant so they could get dinner before finding a hotel.

"All I want is to take a shower," Mary informed Adam as they all sat in a booth away from the doors of the restaurant.

A waitress stepped up to the table then, smiling at them and eyeing Keiran like she wanted to devour him. She looked to be in her early forties, with dark brown hair and brown eyes, and Mary unconsciously scooted closer to Keiran, laying claim to him without saying a word.

"Hi, I'm Carrie," she greeted. "What can I get you to drink?"

"Coffee," Adam requested.

"Sweet tea," Mary added.

"Water," Keiran said softly.

"Do we know what we want, or do you need a little more time?"

Mary looked at Adam pointedly, and he seemed to take the hint, speaking for all three of them. "Three specials, please," he requested.

She glanced at Keiran, obviously disappointed to not hear him speak to order his food, and then she wrote on her pad, walking away with a forced smile on her face.

They all ate in silence, with Carrie making several stops at their table and attempting to engage Keiran in small talk. After the eighth or ninth time, Adam declared they'd been there long enough and asked for the check, much to Carrie's annoyance at him interrupting her conquest. Mary was grateful for Adam's persistence, and once he had everything paid for with a tip left for Carrie, they left the restaurant.

Adam found a hotel near the house where they would be settling, and since he'd told the real estate agent it would be morning before they arrived, he decided to get a room for them to rest inside before driving out the house. It had been a long day for them all, and the last few days had been equally long in comparison. Adam was a little worried of the trail they'd left in Rapid City, and he checked into the hotel under an equally fake name as any of the others he and Mary had ever used. Sometimes, they were Adam and Mary Campbell. Sometimes, it was Adam and Mary James. They'd even used Bobby's name on occasion. They'd decided early on not to go Sam and Dean's route of using references to their favorite bands. Stuff like that was just a little out of place, especially when people caught on. Dean was notorious for using aliases from his favorite bands. John Bonham was one of his favorites.

"We're only going to be here for the night," Adam told Mary and Keiran as they took the stairs to the second level of the hotel where their room was situated. "I got us a double, and we need to stay in tonight. No walks or late night trips to the car. The less people see us, the easier it'll be for us to get out in the morning."

Mary glanced at Keiran, thinking silently that Adam might have already caught onto them, but when he opened the door for her and then allowed Keiran inside before following and shutting the door, she decided it wasn't possible for him to know anything. She and Keiran had been careful, and Adam trusted her. She knew he wouldn't start treating her like a little girl now, not after everything they'd been through together.

She deposited her bags, unceremoniously snatching up her carry-on with all her bathroom things inside and then stepping into the bathroom without a word to either of her car-mates. While she was alone, Mary thought about how much farther away from their last house they actually were, and she wondered if she'd left anything there for anyone to find. She'd never worried about it before, and she was sure she hadn't done it now, but she was still worried. It wasn't safe for anyone to know who she was or what her purpose was, and even if she and Keiran had taken steps to keep others from using her, he was still vulnerable.

Mary took her shower in peace, hearing the tv on when she got out and finding Keiran and Adam on opposite beds when she stepped into the room with steam drifting from the bathroom behind her. Both the beds had been turned down, and Mary unenthusiastically chose the one Adam was residing on to keep him from seeing the look she gave Keiran when he looked at her. Adam made room for her, and she slid beneath the blanket, braiding her hair until she secured it with a tie and then laying down quietly.

Adam didn't say anything to her or Keiran, sitting over in a chair by the window, and Mary glanced at Keiran, silently suggesting that he also get ready for bed since it didn't look like anything bad was going to happen any time soon. He followed her lead then, quietly removing his shoes and then laying over the made bed. Adam turned off most of the lights, and after a few minutes, Mary was so tired she fell asleep instantly.

* * *

As he had before, Adam insisted on giving Mary the largest room of the house he'd found even though it was on the first floor. And Mary still objected even though she knew it would do no good. With the master bedroom on the first floor, it came with a master bathroom and a closet just as her other room had. Keiran and Adam silently settled into the rooms upstairs, and after all the paperwork was taken care of and the realtor was gone, Adam made quick work of putting out all the protective charms and sigils he could pull out of the chest they carried around with them. After he and Mary had been forced to walk over a hundred miles from their previous place of residence, Bobby had armed them with as many things as he possibly could without giving them any weapons a cop might find inspecting the car if they were ever stopped. They didn't have an arsenal in the trunk like Dean and Sam, but none of their possessions were any less effective.

Adam had them set up for a very long time by dark, having kept food from their last house and purchasing all the essentials from a store on the way so they wouldn't have to go to a grocery store for a while. And even when all that ran out, Mary knew they would driving a long way out of the way to get more. She knew the drill.

Mary was used to new places, and as such, it was nothing for her to have to sleep in a new place every now and then. She almost always settled in more easily than Adam did, and though she was never really sure why, she always valued that ability. And now, as she sat in her newest room unpacking the few things she'd been able to bring with her from the last house, Mary was surprised to discover that she wasn't very tired and didn't want to go to sleep.

The new house was on a lake, which was a first for them, and even though her room faced the land side of the house, she could walk to the back doors of her room and look out onto the lake as the moon shined through clear, starry skies. Mary wanted to sit outside and watch the sun come up like she'd done when she'd been with Dean and Sam. But she didn't want to sleep, and apparently, someone else in the house didn't want to either when she heard noise from outside her room.

She stepped out into the house where the Great Room opened up into a living room area and the dining table, hearing the refrigerator open and close before she saw the light above the stove come on. Slowly, she moved closer to the kitchen, thinking maybe Adam was also having trouble settling in, but she was more than a little surprised to find Keiran leaned over the counter next to the stove with a bottle of beer in front of him. At first, he didn't see her, and she was right behind him before he turned to see her there.

"Hey," she whispered, lifting her hand to the back of his neck. "Can't sleep?"

He shook his head. "I could never sleep in a new place at first," he admitted. "Sometimes it took several days before I could relax. And this time . . ."

"You don't have your brother," she finished.

He bowed his head, nodding slowly.

Mary turned him to face her, holding his face between her hands. "It's okay," she promised. "I was the same way at first. When it was just me and Adam, after we were alone, I couldn't get used to the idea of moving around. I'd been with my parents all my life up to that point, and life on the road was . . . hard for me. But having Adam helped. He's taken care of me since I was nine. And I know you don't have anyone really familiar with you now, but I promise Adam and I can be your family now. And once he's used to you, we can tell him the truth. He'll trust you. I'm sure of it."

She pulled him closer until her forehead was against his, and he wrapped his arms around her, holding her as close to him as he could. After a minute, Mary leaned back, getting up on her toes and leaning in close enough to kiss him. She realized she was only wearing a tank top and shorts, and he was only wearing jogging pants, and even though Adam was right upstairs, Mary found herself caring only about Keiran. He seemed to be the same wavelength as her, grasping onto her waist and then turning her back to the counter.

Slowly, the hem of her shirt began easing up her side, and Mary rubbed her hands up Keiran's back to his shoulders, feeling him shiver and smiling against his lips. He eased his lips and then his tongue over her jaw to her neck. Mary shook with her own set of chills, lifting her hands to his face again to kiss him more deeply than she had in a day. Though she and Keiran had been trying to keep Adam from seeing what was going on between them, Mary was still worried about her "brother" discovering what was going on right in front of him. She'd never known Adam to be unobservant, and she didn't want to lie to him, but she was starting to want Keiran more than she didn't want to lie to Adam. And when Keiran tugged on her shirt to pull it off, Mary had no reason to stop him.

"Ahem!"

Startled, Mary immediately covered herself as Keiran turned to reveal Adam in the doorway of the kitchen.

"And this is exactly why you two are not in the rooms upstairs," he asserted. He gestured to Keiran. "Come on. Get back upstairs."

Keiran sighed softly, looking at Mary and leaning closer to kiss her cheek before he slowly stepped across the kitchen and then around Adam to go back upstairs to his room.

After he was gone, Adam looked at Mary.

"Go on," he nodded.

For once, she was grateful that he didn't feel the need to interrogate her, and Mary hurried from the kitchen to get back to her room.

* * *

Spring and Summer in Minnesota was a little different from South Dakota, but only for a few reasons. It was a little hotter and a lot wetter, and there were a few times in July when they thought the lake would flood into their house. A few other people near them were also afraid of the flooding, since it was known to get bad in the summer, but they dodged the bullet each time, only sustaining minor damage to the roof and the porch.

Mary planted a garden in the plots around the house, and even though Adam wasn't sure it was a good thing to settle in quite that much, he helped her with the flowers she wanted to plant, buying everything she would need and even offering to help. Keiran helped her too, bringing seedlings from a nursery nearby to fill a window sill basket in front of Mary's window.

They only went into town for extreme necessities, and after Adam had the wireless internet and the satellite installed, the only reason any of them went into town was for food and bathroom supplies. Mary waited until at least a month went by before she began going into town, finding a small diner and even going to Willow Park which was a few blocks from the diner she'd found. At first, she went by herself, and after they were all settled in, she asked Keiran to come with her. And for a little while, things were as close to normal as they had been before Mary had met Keiran. In fact, having Keiran there made things feel even more normal than Mary believed they could be.

And then her 18th birthday came, and they started planning a trip to visit Bobby. Mary was still a little worried about how everything would go, even though Bobby had already met Keiran. She knew Bobby would want to call Dean and Sam, and she wanted them to meet Keiran, but she was still worried. And Adam tried to reassure her they would be safe, especially if they were all together and the salvage yard was heavily protected by charms and sigils and Cas.

"You're not worried about turning 18 are you?" Adam asked as they packed for the trip.

"Of course not," she grinned. "I'll finally be able to tell you 'no' whenever you ask me to do something," she joked.

"Then what is it?"

Mary sat over her bed as he finished with her last bag and put it in the floor, and he sat next to her taking his hand in hers. "Do you trust Keiran?" she asked softly.

Adam sighed heavily, bowing his head.

"And don't say 'yes' just for me," she pleaded. "Think of everything he's done and everything we've learned, and be honest with me."

He was quiet for almost a minute, speaking quietly. "I want to trust him," Adam promised, and Mary sighed. "And I know you want me to trust him. But there's still so much we don't know about him. And until I know for sure that he's not going to be a problem later on, I can't. Not with you or anything meant to keep you safe."

"But he _is_ keeping me safe," Mary insisted. "And if he wanted to hurt me, we've been living in the house with him for six months. He's had more opportunity than we could possibly imagine. Adam, I love you. And you've taken care of me since I was nine years old. And I've never done anything to make you doubt me, have I?"

He pursed his lips slightly, slitting his eyes, and Mary could see he was stalling even though he knew she was right. She leaned her shoulder into his, and he grinned slightly, turning his gaze to her and leaning closer to kiss her cheek.

"I trust you," he swore. "And if you trust him, then . . . I will too. For now."

Mary smiled, standing up as Keiran appeared in her doorway.

"The car is all packed up. It's getting late," he reminded them.

Adam stood up. "Right," he agreed. "Let's get on the road. I'll be driving all night, and Bobby's expecting us in the morning."

With little else, Mary picked up her bag, following them out of her room and then out of the house. She took her usual place in the back seat, settling in for the seven-hour drive ahead of them to Sioux Falls and finding a new book to keep her occupied.

It was almost dark when they pulled out of their driveway, having locked up the house and turned off every major appliance they could possibly think of to turn off, and even though they could've left in the morning, Adam had decided it was best to drive through the night. It was just safer this way, and Mary had grown accustomed to it. Since leaving Laramie with Keiran in tow, they'd kept as low a profile as they possibly could, even with her making a few trips into town a week. No one had come looking for them even though Adam had been keeping an eye on the news out of Wyoming just to be sure. The search for Keiran hadn't gone any further than state lines since virtually no one had laid eyes on him in the last six months. Adam would keep looking at the news to be on the safe side.

Mary slept most of the way to Bobby's, using the bathroom when they stopped halfway to get gas, and then cuddling up in the back seat since it was still almost two in the morning. She and Keiran stole a few glances and thoughts in the car while Adam was getting gas, but she was so sleepy it didn't amount to very much except for her to assure him her family would get used to him once they got to know him. He was worried, and she knew that without having to read his thoughts which she'd been able to do for the last few months of living in the same house with him.

The sky was just beginning to brighten when Mary opened her eyes the second time, finding Adam still behind the wheel as Keiran slept in the passenger seat. She could see they were pulling into a city larger than Grand Rapids, and she yawned softly as Adam spoke over the low hum of the car.

"It's just after five," he informed her. "We'll be at Bobby's in about twenty minutes. Sam and Dean are already there."

Mary inhaled deeply, still holding her blanket over her shoulder and silently thanking the fortune god for the heater in Adam's car. She silently watched the street lights all go out as they drove across town from the interstate to the south end of Sioux Falls where the salvage yard was located. She remembered it had been six months since she'd seen Bobby, and he'd already done Keiran once over to make sure he wasn't dangerous. She hoped it would help Dean and Sam accept Keiran, but her hopes were low at this point.

The light of the salvage yard gates could be seen from down the gravel road that led them toward Bobby's house, and by then, Keiran was awake in the front seat, waiting patiently to arrive. It made Mary nervous, but the minute she saw the Impala sitting down the path from the front porch, she momentarily forgot what she'd been so worried about, and she remembered that she hadn't seen Dean or Sam in a very long time — almost exactly three years, not since she'd been fifteen.

Adam pulled up behind the Impala, shutting off the engine and getting up to let Mary out of the car as the front door opened with the most welcome creak she'd ever heard in her life. First, she heard the heavy footsteps, and the light on the porch come on to reveal a tall figure stepping outside. She hurried around the car, seeing Sam for the first time in three years and noticing how much older he looked. He smiled when he saw her, laughing down the front steps and then jogging down the path to meet her. Mary laughed too, rushing further along until she was able to leap into his arms that were outstretched to her.

"Sam!" she exclaimed.

He didn't say anything, holding onto her tightly.

After a minute, he set her on the ground, holding her face between his hands and appraising her immediately. "My God, you've grown," he declared. "How is that possible?"

She shrugged. "That's what happens when you go so long without seeing me," she teased.

He pulled her into his arm as Adam and Keiran came up the path with a bag each, and the smile on Sam's face faded slightly when he saw Keiran even though he embraced Adam with his other arm.

"Lookin' good, little brother," he commented, also holding Adam's face and then looking at Keiran again. "Who's this?" he asked softly.

Mary inhaled deeply, reaching for Keiran's hand. "Sam, this is Keiran," she announced. "He's, well, I guess you could call him my boyfriend, but it's a little more complicated than that. Where's Dean?"

"Inside with Bobby and Sarah. Lisa, Ben and Elizabeth are driving in from Chicago. They'll be here later today. Keiran, is it?" Sam asked, turning his attention away from Mary.

"That's right," Keiran acknowledged.

Sam extended his hand slowly. "Sam Winchester."

Keiran reciprocated hesitantly. "Keiran Masters."

"Let's get inside," Adam insisted. "I'm beat. And I'm starving. I hope Bobby's got some breakfast on. I could definitely use it."

Sam slowly agreed, still eyeing Keiran and then bowing his head to pull Mary inside while still holding her in his arm. Adam and Keiran followed diligently, still toting their bags.

"So, how is Dean?" Mary asked as she and Sam stepped onto the porch and then walked through the front door into the kitchen.

Sam smiled. "See for yourself," he suggested just as Dean stepped into her line of sight with a piece of bacon in his mouth.

He exclaimed softly. "Oh! There's the face I've been wanting to see for the last two days," he declared with a wide smile, moving forward and taking her from Sam to hold her in his own arms. "Oh, my God! It's been too long. Adam, what have you been feeding this girl? She's growing like a frickin weed!"

Adam smiled, setting his bag down. "She's still a teenager, I guess," he shrugged. "She eats whatever she can find. It's not my fault."

Dean leaned back to look at Mary, gazing at her like he hadn't seen her in years — which made sense since he hadn't. And then, finally, he saw Keiran, and the smile on his face faded. Mary sighed softly, ready to answer all his questions just like she'd answered all of Bobby's.

"You must be Keiran," Dean said. "Bobby told me about you. I'm Dean."

He extended his hand to Keiran's, and again, Keiran reciprocated hesitantly. Mary realized Dean didn't have to say anything to intimidate Keiran. He was doing it with his eyes.

"What's all this ruckus goin' on in my kitchen?" Bobby exclaimed even as he stepped into the room with a smile on his face. "You idjits ain't supposed to be hoggin' the birthday girl." Then he turned to Mary. "And you. Where's my hug?"

Mary moved forward happily, wrapping her arms around the man who was for all intents and purposes her father.

"You tired?" he asked, leaning back to look at her.

Mary shook her head. "I slept on the way here," she informed him. "Adam's probably really tired."

Bobby looked at Adam. "Then by all means," he gestured up the stairs. "Go on. Breakfast'll be here when you come out of your cave."

Adam didn't argue, bowing his head and turning to go upstairs.

Mary exhaled gently as soon as Adam was gone, moving to Keiran's side and guiding him to the table where all the food was setting. She was relieved to say the least, especially now that the house hadn't imploded the way she'd feared. Her stomach growled, and she sat Keiran down with her so they could get something to eat.

* * *

_Something's wrong,_ she thought as she laid over a stone white altar with binds around her ankles and wrists. There was also an IV in her arm and a strap over her head to prevent her from looking around. It wouldn't have mattered if she could look around. She was inside a dark, dank cave with only a couple of hanging lanterns to light the space around her. And she was scared — even if that wasn't her biggest problem.

Memories of when she'd been nine had been flooding back to her this whole time, and the only thing she could think about was how all of this was impossible. She was supposed to be safe. None of this was supposed to be happening to her again.

Soft footsteps from above her head caused her heart to jump into her throat, and within seconds, she saw him above her. Her boyfriend. He'd brought her here. He was one of them, and even though she was scared of him now, he still tried to keep her calm.

"It's all right," he whispered, his green eyes flashing at her. "You need to stay calm. The faster your heart beats, the faster you lose your blood. And even if it's all I want from you, there's no need for this to be unpleasant."

She squeezed her eyes shut, refusing to look at him. But she knew he was right. She'd been studying biology, for God's sake. Every time her heart sped up, she got light-headed, and she knew why. It was the IV. Right now, it was carrying blood out of her body and into destinations unknown. She'd given blood before, and the sensation was only too familiar, if not intensified by the fact that she knew she would be giving much more than a pint this time.

This time, she knew she wouldn't wake up if she went to sleep.

"I can make it easier for you," he said, caressing her cheek. _"Somnus quod operor non somnium," _he whispered, stroking her jaw and whispering it again.

Slowly, her eyelids began to feel heavy. She fought the sensation as hard as she could, thinking of anything she could to stay awake, but nothing worked. His face was the last thing she saw before the darkness enveloped her, and she began to realize what was happening.

She was going to die.

* * *

**A few odds and ends before I go. I promise we will be back in the "thick" of the story when the next chapter begins. Girl Scout's honor, and yes, I was a girl scout - a very long time ago. Also, I'm hoping to have the next chapter out a lot sooner than the one before this one, but I make no guarantees. Real life and all.**

**Also, I know we're all thinking, wait a second, what did Sam and Dean really think of Keiran, and what about that blood Adam took from Donovan? All in good time. Trust me. This story will be a little longer than the last one, with a few more chapters to feel a little more than just an episode of the show. Think more like the book tie-in publications. I have a couple. Check some out at your local bookstore.**

**Translations: _Somnus quod operor non somnium -_ Sleep but do not dream (Latin) (I used a translator, and those things are not easy to come by, so if it's wrong, let me know)**

**So, that's all for now. Don't forget to tell me what you think. I hope you're enjoying the story, and I'll see you on the next run!  
**


	5. Old Legends

**Not a lot to say up here, except I know it's been a month, but real life got in the way.**

**We're officially back to the "present," which is when Dean and Sam were in Albany, and now they're in Sioux Falls about half a day after talking to Bobby.**

**Again, no references to Season Six. I hope that isn't what's keeping everyone away, but oh, well. If you read it, and like it, that's all I really care about.**

**I don't own Supernatural. I just like to write stories about Dean and Sam where they're NOT doing . . . that.**

* * *

**Old Legends**

Dean pulled into Sioux Falls knowing exactly what he was going to do as soon as he got to Bobby's, and after another long drive from New York to South Dakota reminiscent of the one he'd made almost eleven years earlier, he'd had plenty of time to put all the pieces together. And one thing he was absolutely sure about was the fact that someone he'd come to trust had been lying to him the entire time he'd known them. And if there was something Dean didn't like, it was someone he trusted lying to him. Dean could barely tolerate lying on a good day, and today was not a good day.

After talking to Bobby and then immediately getting on the way here, Dean made Sam get on the computer to find out anything he could about what they were facing like he had last time, and just like last time, there was very little to go on. He'd tried to call Cas again, but the angel was conveniently out of "calling" range. Dean figured he was probably off somewhere doing something he thought was really important. According to Dean, there was nothing more important than this — even with Lilith out of commission.

"You sure about this?" Sam asked from the passenger seat. "They might not even be here yet."

"I'm sure, Sam," Dean exhaled. "And if they're not here, then that gives me more time to get ready."

"She's not gonna like this," Sam insisted softly. "Even if we have a really good reason for it."

Dean said nothing, holding the steering wheel steadily and turning onto the road to get to Bobby's. In all honesty, Dean didn't really care if he made a couple of people unhappy with what he was about to do. Everything he did, he did it to protect the people he loved and cared about, and this was for one of those people now. This was for Mary's own good, whether she liked it or not.

Bobby's driveway was blessedly empty, and Dean guessed that meant Adam and Mary weren't there yet. He didn't think about their other passenger. Right now, he had plans to make and traps to set. He had books to read, and if need be, he wanted to have as many holy relics available to him as possible. Whether Mary would want to believe it or not, she'd allowed a servant of the devil into her life. And Dean wanted to know why.

The front door opened as Dean and Sam emerged from the Impala, and Bobby came down the steps to meet them halfway down the front walk.

"You're early," he told them. "Wasn't expectin' you for another few hours."

"Yeah, well, stuff like this takes a front seat to sleep and food. Adam and Mary here?"

Bobby hesitated, and Dean looked at Sam before they moved around him to go inside. Bobby hurried around and stood in front of them. "Dean, you need to keep a cool head right now," Bobby warned. "Based on everything you found, I know what it looks like, but it's been eleven years. Lilith is dead. Lucifer ain't comin' back."

"This is worse than anything we've faced, Bobby," Dean informed him. "Is she here?"

Bobby sighed softly. "She and Adam were a lot closer than I thought when I called them. They got here not long after I called. They're _all_ here. While you think it might be worse, it's a lot more complicated than it used to be."

"Where is she?" Sam asked.

"She's in the front room, with Keiran."

The mention of the name was enough to turn Dean's stomach, and he bypassed Bobby a second time, stepping up the steps and then opening the front door that opened up into the kitchen. It felt warmer now than it had the first time Dean had been inside it more than fifteen years earlier, and then he looked into the front room, he saw one of the reasons why it felt this way sitting at the desk with a book in her hands. She looked exactly the way he remembered from just a few months ago, except she looked a little happier and seemed to be glowing from the inside out. Behind her, Dean saw the kid he'd trusted with Mary's safety. That had been his first mistake. Then Mary lifted her eyes to his and smiled.

She put her book down, hurrying around the desk and running into Dean's arms as he caught her easily. "We've been waiting for you," she exclaimed. "Adam had to go into town for dinner, but I wanted to be here when you got here. Keiran found a few of Bobby's books interesting, so we sat down to read. What's going on? Bobby said you made it sound serious."

Dean squeezed her against him, wishing he'd never left her and Adam alone. Then he leaned back to look at her. "Well, it is kinda serious," he admitted. "When is Adam gonna be back?"

"A little while, I guess," she shrugged. "He said something about Mexican. Where are you driving from?"

Dean averted his eyes to Keiran. "Albany," he revealed, watching the young man's eyes carefully but seeing no change. That told Dean he'd been expecting it.

Bobby and Sam came into the room then, and Dean spoke urgently. "Bobby, take Mary upstairs," he requested. "Sam and I have some things to discuss with . . . Keiran."

The happy look on Mary's face faded. "Why do you need to talk to him now?" she asked. "Bobby said this was about a case."

"It is about a case," Dean acknowledged. "One I need to talk to him about. Mary, just trust me. I'm trying to protect you," he whispered, feeling the cover over his anger and disbelief fall away slowly.

"But why do you need to talk to Keiran about your case? Do you think it involves him?" she asked, glancing at Keiran and then Sam before she looked at Dean again. "What's going on? What happened in Albany?"

"We're still trying to figure that out," Sam lied smoothly. "Just trust us, Mary. Go upstairs. It's okay."

She stood there a minute, staring at Dean and Sam and trying to comprehend what they were saying. Then she folded her arms over her chest and stepped away from Dean slowly. "No," she said. "Whatever you have to say, whatever it is you've found, you can say all of it in front of me. I'm not a little girl anymore. I can handle it."

Dean sighed softly. "Mary, please. This is serious."

"And you think I didn't know that all the other times we were hunting?" she argued. "You think I don't know that now? What's going on?" she asked again.

Dean glanced at Sam, and Bobby spoke after another minute.

"You probably need to start with the picture," he said.

Sam didn't hesitate, reaching into his jacket pocket and pulling out an envelope along with his phone. "A girl disappeared in Albany last week," he began. "Annabeth Miller. She was sixteen. Her parents were evasive, and we discovered they weren't her real parents. When we went back to talk to them, we found them dead. While we were there, someone else came into their hotel room, and even after we got away, they followed us into the hallway."

"So?" Mary asked.

"Annabeth Miller," Dean began, "was one of the girls who was kidnaped when you were eight, Mary. She was supposed to be one of the girls sacrificed. The people posing as her parents were less than surprised that she was taken, and the person who came to their hotel room wasn't just a random person. I recognized him, and for a second, it looked like he recognized me."

"Who was it?" Mary asked.

Sam opened the envelope in his hands, pulling out a photo and then handing it to Mary. The brave face she'd had before slowly faded, and she looked at Sam with haunted eyes. He sighed heavily, turning on his phone and then pulling up a photo before he showed it to her. A new expression filled Mary's brilliant green eyes. Fear.

Dean took this as a sign that Mary recognized the face in the photo and on the phone as the same face, and he looked at Keiran as the young man stood by silently. "The first photo was taken over eight months ago. Adam took it when he was called by Mary to the house of a boy she was just barely starting to date. There was blood, and Adam took a sample of it. But there were no wounds. Not a bullet hole. Not a puncture hole. Just blood."

Keiran glanced at Mary, and when she tried to step closer, Sam stopped her. Dean watched with a measure of detachment, returning his attention to Keiran.

"The second photo was taken last night outside the hotel room where we found two people dead — slaughtered like animals," he grit through his teeth. "And based on what Adam told us, this is supposed to be your dead brother." Dean held the phone up in front of Keiran, watching his eyes carefully. "I don't know about you, but he doesn't look very dead to me, especially since I watched him walk around that hotel room like he was looking for something."

"Dean," Mary shouted.

"Sam, take her upstairs," he ordered.

Despite Sam having more than a foot and probably a hundred pounds on Mary, she pushed him away. "I'm not leaving," she cried.

"This kid is a goddamn liar, and he's lying to you," Dean yelled. "Don't you remember any of the stuff we told you about this? Do you want to die?"

"I'm not a little girl," she yelled back. "And I was there too. How were we supposed to know Donovan wasn't dead? There was blood everywhere."

"And did you even ask the police if it was _his_ blood?" Dean demanded. "Have we taught you nothing?"

"I'm not blind," Mary screamed. "And I'm not stupid. And why didn't you tell me you had Adam take blood for some stupid hunch you always seem to have? When am I going to start making choices about my life?"

"Both of you stop," Sam shouted over them. Mary huffed moving further away from them, and Sam glanced at Bobby just as the door opened to allow Adam into the kitchen.

He saw them all there, putting the white paper sacks down and moving into the front room. "What's going on here?" he asked uncertainly.

Dean spoke up, his voice still elevated. "What's goin' on here is I'm gonna get the goddamn truth out of this lying bastard before I gut him, and no one is going to stop me." He made another move toward Keiran, and Mary shouted.

"Dean, he's innocent!"

"We'll see about that," Dean murmured. "Who are you?" he demanded.

For a minute, Keiran said nothing, and Dean moved in closer. He grabbed Keiran by the shirt and shoved him into the book case. "Tell me who you are!"

"I'm Keiran," he stuttered. "I'm John and Helen Masters' son. I'm Mary's boyfriend."

"Are you one of them?" Dean accused. "One of those human-demon bastards out to resurrect Lilith from her permanent siesta. You think I'm blind? You think I didn't see it the first time I saw you? Brown hair, green eyes. Just like Mary."

"Dean!" Mary yelled.

Keiran stared at Dean a long minute, inhaling deeply and pleading softly. "I can explain," he admitted, confirming all Dean's suspicions and eliciting a violent reaction from the eldest Winchester as Dean's fist connected with Keiran's jaw. The younger man groaned as the back of his head hit the book case, and Dean hit him again, this time causing him to double over with his hands over his face.

"Dean, stop," Mary cried.

"Sam, keep her back," Dean ordered, lifting Keiran up again and then punching him a third time. Keiran didn't fight back, remaining on his hands and knees as his nose and mouth both bled. Dean leaned over to look at him, delivering as heavy a threat as he possibly could. "You're going to tell me everything that's going on," he informed Keiran. "And you're going to tell me the truth. And then I'm going to kill you."

"Dean, please," Mary begged. "He's not a demon, and he's not a threat. He's human. You know that."

"I also know he's lying about more than what he's said," Dean hissed.

He pulled Keiran up from the floor, sitting him in an arm chair and tying him to it without any indication of what he was about to do. But no one tried to stop Dean. Mary watched in horror as Dean pulled the chair into a Devil's Trap and then brandished a knife.

"Who are you?" Dean asked again. "How many of you are there?"

"My name is Keiran Masters," was the soft reply. "I'm an only child. I was adopted when I was a baby. I never knew Donovan. I didn't meet him until I was nine when my adoptive parents died. I never knew what I was."

"And exactly what is that?" Sam asked, still holding Mary away from him and Dean.

Keiran hesitated, and Dean leaned in, pressing the blade of the knife to this throat and threatening to end his life right there.

"He told me I was Lilin," Keiran exhaled as the blade began to tear a line along the bottom of his jaw. "He told me I had a destiny."

"And what was that?" Dean demanded.

"To fulfil my purpose," Keiran said simply.

Dean stood up then, exhaling heavily. "How many of you are there?"

"I only know three others. But I haven't seen them in a year, not since I met Mary. I don't know where they are or what they've done. I disassociated myself from them eight months ago."

"And exactly what does that mean?" Sam pleaded with Mary in his arms. "And why would you do that?"

"To prevent this," they all heard and turned to see Cas there alone.

"To prevent what?" Dean shouted.

Cas moved into the front room, facing Keiran with Dean and then looking at Mary before he spoke. "There's a ceremony used by the Lilin to separate members to diminish suspicion. It makes detecting them more difficult since the Lilin are tracked through thoughts and memories."

"And why would he need to do that?" Sam inquired moving closer slowly.

"Because like their female counterparts, Male Lilin are connected by a line of blood connecting them to their maker."

"Lilith," Sam deduced.

"No," Cas corrected. "Samael."

"The fallen angel?" Bobby asked.

Cas nodded, stepping closer to Keiran as he sat tied to the chair. "Together, Lilith and Samael created half-breeds — half human and half demon. Over the millennia, the demonic half has been diluted, especially in the children born to two humans. It made them more difficult to track, but every few hundred years, we would find one. And we would try to remove the child from Samael's possession."

"Samael isn't still . . . alive, is he?" Sam asked.

Cas turned his attention to Mary as she now stood away from Sam. "Even Fallen Angels serve a purpose," he informed Sam. "And only another Angel can kill him. We've been attempting to locate him, but even Michael has been unable to sense his presence. Only Samael's children can find him. Only his children can hear him and abide by his will."

"And exactly what is that?" Dean asked, still standing next to the chair Keiran was tied to.

Cas looked at Dean. "To ensure Lilith's survival."

The room was silent for a few minutes, and Mary slowly moved toward Dean as he stood next to Keiran still holding the knife. Then Sam spoke.

"If Samael's children are supposed to keep Lilith alive, then why are they still around? She's dead. Shouldn't have all of his "children" disappeared into oblivion? Isn't that what all fallen angels do when their subordinates don't follow their rules?"

"They weren't his subordinates," Cas assured Sam. "And they were flesh and blood. Killing them would've raised too much suspicion. And it was for that reason we were able to use his weakness for them to our advantage — much like the Demons have always used your weakness for Dean against you and his weakness for you against him."

"To do what?" Adam asked, reminding everyone he was still in the room.

"To find a daughter of Lilith, and to remove a son of Samael from his possession. We didn't find Mary until 19 years ago."

Dean looked at Keiran, still holding the knife and moving in again. "How old are you?" he demanded.

"I'm 19," he insisted, pausing for a few seconds before he continued with his eyes on the knife in Dean's hand. "But when I was nine, I was given a gift of longevity."

"And what year was it?" Sam asked.

Keiran glanced at Mary, clenching his jaws and lifting his eyes to Dean. "1914."

Cas moved away from Keiran slowly, and Sam took his place, glancing at Dean. "You were born in 1905?" he asked Keiran.

"Yes. November 2."

Dean glanced at Sam, and when Dean raised the knife, Keiran spoke urgently.

"Please, I told you I can explain. I know what it seems. And in the beginning, it was exactly what you think. But it changed. I changed. I don't want them to hurt her any more than you do. And she knows all of this. I couldn't keep it from her. I love her."

Dean grabbed Keiran again, clamping a hand over Keiran's throat. "You're not capable of love, you pathetic piece of shit," he spat. "You took advantage of her being alone, and you used her."

Keiran shook his head. "No. Please. I swear it's all true. You're wrong about me."

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't rip you apart right now," Dean grit out through his teeth.

"Because I can help you. Because I love her just as much as you do," Keiran swore. "Maybe more. Because I am exactly like her — meant to be used, unable to have will of my own unless I choose it." He inhaled, swallowing carefully as Dean still held his throat. "If they'd had me from birth, it would've been too easy to manipulate me. But my parents didn't die until I was nine years old," he repeated. "That's when Donovan came to get me. He's not my real brother. He's only bound to me by our mutual survival. While others died, we survived. We took care of each other until the others found us. You need me, because you have no idea what will happen to her if you kill me."

Sam reached for Dean's hand, pulling it from Keiran's throat and then also removing the knife from his hand before he looked at Cas. "Why would you need a daughter of Lilith and a son of Samael? For what reason?"

Cas looked at Mary, staring half a minute before he also looked at Keiran. Then he spoke. "There is a legend that says if a daughter of Lilith and a son of Samael were to join under the blessing of Heaven, they would be able to dispose of Samael for good. No exorcism. No banishment. No prison. Death, for all time."

Sam looked at Dean, and they both looked at Adam before they all looked at Mary as she stood close to Keiran. She didn't say anything, kneeling in front of Keiran to untie his hands and ankles and then pulling him to his feet to sit him over the cot off to the side of the room. She didn't look at her family, focusing on Keiran completely as he still bled.

* * *

Mary walked Keiran upstairs away from the other men in her family, and while she was gone, Dean and Sam proceeded to interrogate Cas, desperate to understand why they were still trusting someone who'd obviously lied to become a part of Mary's life.

"How could you risk Mary's life that way?" Dean demanded. "How could you purposefully allow them to find her, just hoping what happened to us would happen to them too?"

"I had to trust Mary's instincts," Cas argued, resting against Bobby's desk as Dean, Sam, Bobby and Adam all faced him. "And she was the only one who could see if he was honest or not. The same way she saw it in all of us. And Michael. She has a . . . power over nearly everyone she encounters. The older she becomes, the stronger of a pull she possesses over . . . members of the opposite sex, especially if she's . . . in a certain state at the time."

Neither Dean nor Sam caught on to what he was saying, but Bobby and Adam understood immediately, both laughing softly.

"You wanna let us in on the joke?" Sam asked, oblivious.

"He's talkin' about when she's on her period," Bobby informed the middle Winchester. "If that ain't a kick in the head."

Dean blinked, staring at Cas. "You're serious? And it doesn't work on us for what reason?"

"Because we were all in her life before she began," Cas explained. "Adam can attest to it, since he's seen her use this ability several times."

Sam turned to Adam. "Really? Why didn't you ever tell us?"

Adam glanced at Cas and then Bobby before he spoke awkwardly. "Because the first time I saw her do it, I didn't know what she was doing. She was eleven, for God's sake! And it was so subtle. It wasn't like she was hurting anyone, but I told her it was wrong. And I tried to stop her any time she tried to do it after I knew what she was doing."

"When was the last time?" Dean asked.

Adam lifted his eyes, shifting uncomfortably and then speaking softly. "It was the night we found . . . Donovan dead — or whatever. She did it to the cop who tried to ask Keiran about his brother — or whoever. I kept her from doing it to the other cop that came the next morning, but after that, we left, and Keiran was with us. She apparently didn't feel the need to do it anymore."

Dean inhaled slowly, keeping his arms folded over his chest and thinking about everything he'd heard so far. Though he didn't like it, Dean actually believed it was better to have Keiran here where he could watch the kid, as opposed to out in the world somewhere with these other dicks looking for him while they were apparently in the process of sacrificing the girls Dean and Sam had saved eleven years earlier.

"What will the Lilin do now?" Sam asked. "Now that Mary's basically grown up, and she's able to sway the men around her."

Cas inhaled himself, standing up straight. "They've already begun the ritual to resurrect Lilith's essence. Even with her being killed eleven years ago, these Lilin are much more practiced in dark magic than their female counterparts were before. They still need the blood of six pure girls, and they've already begun to collect it."

"I thought they all had to be together before that part could be started," Adam interjected.

"These Lilin have discovered a . . . loophole in the rules of the ritual," Cas explained. "And they've moved their plans up significantly. Already, they've taken three of the sacrifices, and we've been unable to locate the caverns where they're performing the ritual."

At the mention of "we," Dean scoffed softly. "Yeah, I've seen how much work he's done," he said of Michael. "I'm guessing he's off workin' some kinda deal with some pals of his on the wrong side of the tracks."

"Dean," they heard and turned to see Eleanor there alone, "I'm disappointed. After everything we've been through together."

Dean and Sam gave her a wide berth as she eased into the room. Her high-heeled calf-high boots clicked along the wooden floor, and she grinned at Dean as she settled next to Cas against Bobby's desk.

"What are you doing here?" Sam asked.

"You could call me a messenger," she suggested, "as long as you promise not to shoot me."

"Where's Michael?" Adam asked.

She glanced at him, her green eyes shining brilliantly. "Keeping an eye on things worth keeping an eye on," she reported vaguely. "And if he wanted you — any of you — to know that he would've come himself."

"What else is new?" Dean grunted.

"Now, Dean," she chastised. "It's not nice to make assumptions about a situation you know nothing about. Especially when you're the one who started all of this."

Dean stood up to confront her, but Sam stopped him.

"That's enough," he proclaimed. "This isn't about Michael anyway. This is all about Mary. It's about a ritual meant to rob her of everything we were trying to save. And I don't really care who helps. As long as they're helping."

"And bravo," Eleanor quipped. "To the one man in the room who understands what's important in life. And without anyone having to prompt him."

"Eleanor," Cas shouted. "What are you doing here?"

She leaned back into the desk, inhaling and folding her arms over her chest in an attempt to mimic Dean. "I'm here to watch Keiran," she revealed. "To make for certain his brothers won't sense him now that he's with Mary. I know Cas told you about the legend. I'm here to help see it through."

"And exactly how is that?" Adam asked.

Eleanor smiled, her brilliant white teeth shining as brightly as her eyes. "Apparently, Castiel didn't tell you the entire legend," she chuckled, laying her hand on Cas' shoulder and patting softly. "Castiel. Shame on you."

"All he said was that if a daughter of Lilith and a son of Samael joined until a blessing of heaven, they could stop Samael," Sam recounted. "What's so funny?"

"And how do you think they do that, Mr. Oblivious?" she teased. "Maybe we should bring Dr. Ruth in to explain it to you."

"Dr. Ruth?" Adam repeated. "Isn't she a sex therapist or something?"

At the mention of "sex," Dean balked. "Oh, you gotta be kidding me," he pleaded. "Seriously? Isn't that, like, wrong? Aren't they . . . related or something else sick and twisted?"

"No," Eleanor announced. "Mary and Keiran aren't related. Not in the human sense anyway. Her parents were . . . shall we say, unorthodox for sure, but Keiran's parents died a very long time before Mary was born. Mary and Keiran are both Lilin, but with two very different kinds of destiny. You know all about destiny, don't you, Dean? Sam and Adam too."

Dean ignored the warning in Sam's eyes, stepping closer to Eleanor as she stood up straight to face him. Though Dean was most decidedly taller than her, her eyes commanded respect. Dean ignored that too. "All I know about destiny is that it's a piss-poor excuse for not being able to take responsibility for your own actions," he hissed, lacing as much disgust and hate into his voice as possible. "And the last time anybody tried to force mine on me, only a year went by before I sent his ass packin' about as much as I'd like to do to you. Lady, you don't know shit about Mary, and I'll be damned if I'm gonna let some skank-whore turned born-again angel dictate what she does or doesn't do with her life."

The shine in her eyes turned gold slightly, and Dean felt heat against his shoulders the way he had whenever he angered an angel, but he couldn't take it back. Mary was more his family than she was anyone else's, and he wouldn't let any decisions be made for her — even if it meant insulting someone she could've easily become.

While Eleanor could've just smite him right there, she grinned again, glancing at Cas and then disappearing from the room, the soft sound of fluttering wings following after her.

"Dean," Cas said, "you really shouldn't anger her. She's done as much as we have protecting Mary. And she does know how to keep them hidden. It's one of the reasons why Michael kept her around."

"I don't care," Dean stated plainly. "Is it true? Do Mary and Keiran have to . . . do the horizontal tango for this legend to be true?"

Cas bowed his head, confirming Dean's accusations.

* * *

Mary moved a soft cloth over Keiran's mouth, wiping away more blood and holding his jaw in her other hand. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "We should've been more careful."

"It's all right," he grimaced, leaning away from the cloth. "I knew it would happen one day. I knew I was never truly innocent, not even after we . . ."

Mary lowered the cloth, turning his face to hers as he lowered his eyes to keep from looking in hers. "Is it true?" she pleaded. "This legend. If we . . . joined under a blessing, would it end all of this? Would we be . . . free?"

He hesitated, swallowing carefully. "I think so," he admitted. "But it isn't that simple."

She made him look at her, seeing a flicker of fear in his eyes and laying her hands over his cheeks. "Then make it simple," she commanded softly.

He inhaled deeply, swallowing again and extending his hands to hold her waist. "We wouldn't only have to join, Mary," he whispered. "All of my impurities would have to burned away first. And you possess so few, but still."

"Burned away," she repeated. "How? And how is it possible now that we've already . . . joined. A lot."

Keiran blushed, scooting closer and resting his forehead over hers. "The act of coupling isn't what makes us impure, Mary. It doesn't make anyone impure. It's the thoughts and feelings that should follow coupling. We had sex, Mary. We didn't sell our souls to the devil. We couldn't have."

"Why?"

"Because the devil is in a cage in hell," he reminded her. "And most of his servants are still trying to break him free. They wouldn't care about making a deal with one of us for any reason."

"And that's why you need me," they heard and looked up to see Eleanor as she stood at the doorway, now dressed completely in white when before she'd been dressed more as a human.

Keiran eased closer to Mary, holding her closer to protect her as Eleanor moved closer.

"I won't hurt you," she promised, pulling a chair to the bed they were both sitting on and sitting down. "And I won't tell anyone. It will be important. But Michael will eventually find out. And he won't be . . . pleased."

Mary held onto Keiran tighter. "Well, excuse me for being so bold, but Michael isn't my father, so I don't really care if he's pleased or not."

Eleanor bowed her head, and after a minute, she spoke again. "In order for the legend to be used, you'll both have to surrender to each other. And that's only after you've been blessed by a servant of heaven."

"How do we do that?" Keiran asked softly.

"How are any humans blessed by heaven?" Eleanor asked. "They're married in a house of God. Castiel will tell as much to Dean and Sam, but the choice is ultimately all yours. Because this journey will not be easy, and it will not be pleasant. And since you've already claimed each other's innocence, the road will prove to be a little more difficult. We won't be able to tell Dean or Sam or Adam why, but by then Castiel will know."

Mary leaned back, lifting her eyes to Keiran as he leaned in closer and kissed her. "Mary," he whispered. "Will you . . . marry me?"

She laughed softly, kissing him back and caressing the length of his nose with hers. "I will," she whispered.

* * *

He looked at the three barely alive girls before him and was satisfied with their progress despite the betrayal they were all feeling. He hadn't heard from his brother in almost nine months, and it was . . . disconcerting to think that whore had been able to sway him the wrong way. In all honesty, he didn't really think of her as a whore — only tainted, by humanity. It had been worse with Eleanor. They'd lost her to the enemy, and that was something completely unforgivable. But the Daughter was another matter entirely.

An image of her played in his mind as he stood guard over the girls who'd now been drained of nearly all their blood. A feeling he could only describe as curiosity filtered through his torso, and he fought it furiously. He was the oldest. It was his duty to see this through when so many others before him had failed. He couldn't fail. No matter how much of her remained inside him. He remembered her touch, and his body would've bent to her will. But he was more determined than most. Her innocence wouldn't stop him. Not like it had stopped others.

"You're beginning to lose your focus," the second eldest announced from the opposite side of the cavern they were currently occupying.

"Watch your tongue," he warned the impetuous boy. "I know my duty."

"Does that include feeling sorry for them?" the second eldest asked of the unconscious girls.

"You're confusing pity with indifference, Adrian," he told his brother.

"And you're practically pulsing with curiosity, Donovan," Adrian accused. "Didn't we agree she wasn't worth losing our sanity over?"

"We also agreed that you wouldn't question the precarious position we found ourselves in when Keiran didn't return. He'll come around in the end. I know him. Better than she does."

"And that's why you haven't dragged him back here kicking and screaming?" Adrian demanded. "After you took your female, I was surprised you didn't take a more active role. Sullivan is still keeping his female comfortable."

"Keiran knew what he was doing," Donovan barked. "And I know he'll be back. His instincts prevent him from avoiding the truth, and he knows they'll all want him dead when it's over, even if he helps them now."

"You haven't thought for a split second that he might've — "

"No," Donovan shouted. "I trust him. He wouldn't betray me. Not for her. I've been with him a hundred years. It will mean more to him than the twelve months he's been with her."

Adrian didn't argue, moving around the three altars holding their sacrifices. "We'll need to appear to the last three a second time now," he said of the last three sacrifices. "Now that Keiran is with her hunters, they'll be working to stop us. We must complete the circle."

"You will have to go to New York," Donovan announced, remaining where he'd been standing the entire time. "Sullivan and I have been spotted there on two separate occasions. I'll go to California, and Sullivan will go to Washington State. Leave."

Adrian didn't pause, disappearing instantly, and Donovan thought while he was alone that he needed to verify Keiran's trust before he began a new seduction. He had to validate his brother's loyalty before they continued, or it would all be for nothing.

* * *

**Maybe no references to Season Six, but definitely some references to Resurrection, so if you haven't read that, you'll be lost here. I hate to post stuff like, 'If you don't read the other one, you'll be lost here,' but it's completely true.**

**Again, thanks for reading, and if anyone's still reading, leave me a comment or review to let me know what you think, even if you don't like it. I'll take anything at this point.  
**


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